| Red House Painters – Medicine Bottle Lyrics | 1 year ago |
| 10/10 song. anyway, my perception is that he's stuck in a cycle where the thing he wants/lusts after is the thing bringing him down. and he keeps relying on the lust object to make him escape the pain that comes after the indulgence. basically, a song about co-dependence on sexual intimacy. he's let himself be convinced that it will/ can last forever and he's planning in his mind to scheme/ reproduce the intimacy, but it's not actually in his control, and he's reluctantly seeing the sober reality as the fantasized one dissipates. the medicine bottle represents an inability to let go of the fantasy. the sober reality is expressed by the knife in the back and the underwear tossed over the alarm clock. basically, he knows deep down the intimacy is not actually about him getting his dreams fulfilled, but being merely objectified by someone else for a short time. the pain, i think, comes from the disparity in how long the objectification lasts between the 2 of them, where he doesn't truly get what he wants for as long as he wants it, but she does. and the fact that he has this intense fantasy about what it meant is recognized by the lover, but when she says it's all in his head, he gets bitter/ jaded and begins to trust the sober feeling once she removed the rosey part. this is expressed by hiding in his room, as a way to isolate from the world that promised things falsely and added to his pain. the other side of the wall, the world and life he has to live to get that initimacy to come to him again, is something he doesn't want to deal with. but he is addicted to how the intimacy made him feel, so the cycle between punishing codependency and being realistic and safe from his own delusions keeps going on. this interpretation is largely funnelled through my own experience of serial masterbation high and being convinced a girl was into me based on one showing of interest, where i began to believe every delusion that offered me the rosiest feeling, because i wanted to. i've had a need to keep a high going, and it's been hard to accept the reality not controlled by me. basically, my medicine bottle is one i actually can keep on the shelf (porn/masterbation high) and bring out whenever i want. in Mark's case, the medicine he wants is one he can't have as often as he wants. | |
| Screaming Trees – Sworn And Broken Lyrics | 3 years ago |
| @N0 C0DE 79 , i dont know if it's a hopeful song, in the sense that it's optimistic. but i do think it's candidness about vowing to get clean....he had quit drinking by this point but was enslaved to drugs | |
| Screaming Trees – Witness Lyrics | 3 years ago |
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i think he's referring to the need to believe in God because his life is witness to the need for hope in him...i say that because his other songs point to a christian world view as well but if it's the opposite, i wouldnt be surprised. |
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| Screaming Trees – Julie Paradise Lyrics | 3 years ago |
| @[JeffZepp:44574] , this sounds pretty accurate | |
| Screaming Trees – Halo Of Ashes Lyrics | 3 years ago |
| after listening to the 12 hour youtube video of mark's memoirs of his life, which is mostly a never ending battle with severe drug addiction, i can confidently say the "she" who is wearing the halo of ashes is either drugs, or the self-destructive life....but seeing how intensely he was addicted to drugs, i would say it's drugs. he's comparing the fleeting pleasure of drugs to an angel tempting him, but her halo is ashes, not something actually glorious....ashes obviously represent death....drugs are his angel of death. | |
| Mark Lanegan – Wildflowers Lyrics | 3 years ago |
| i meant to say the person he is talking to immediately is himself, not a different person living a similarly shitty life. | |
| Mark Lanegan – Wildflowers Lyrics | 3 years ago |
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i've always connected to mark lanegan's work on an extremely boots-hit-the-ground level. one of the things i believe is a main theme in his first 2 albums is God trying to get a hold of him spiritually, and how paranoid it's making him, especially given how strong his drug addiction is impacting his life. i believe wildflowers is a reference to heaven, a place he's always subconsciously believed in, but didn't really have a reason to care about, until the time of the events of this album...i say that because that's one of the things in this world i've associated with heaven: beautiful, vast areas of living plants/ things...when i was a kid, God spiritually communicated to me when i was looking at a tall flower garden that was in front of a wooded area, and the existence of such a place in a different world was randomly beamed into my conscience without me construing it as from God until later.. the person he is talking to in the song "i have to watch you come back to earth" is someone who has as shitty a life as him, but believes/ hopes in God/ heaven. the idea of such hope seems foolish considering how unreligious or "christian"-like his life is.... the "watch you come back to earth" part is about him trying to be realistic and not believe in what he is being made to hope in from another source. "will you still be convinced wildflowers are waiting for you" is him being tempted to look at his life instead of his hope....ie,"do you really think you will go to heaven looking like this?" "In my mind I've done good things And never cared why And my mind is an open door, with nothing inside" he's realizing that his way of thinking is based on nothing, yet something made him do things he thought were good "Looks like the autumn is upon us It's turnin' so cold When everything said's either faded out Or written in stone If you could find an easier road, you'd take it today You could have taken me anywhere You just take it away" after experiencing something really powerful and hope-giving, it's back to the standard cold, lonely laneganism. he's talking to himself and God, understanding the wisdom of a theoretical easier road, but realizes that God, who had the power to give him an easier life, took away the power to go that road, leaving him where he is, struggling. My reasoning for this is heavily based on the fact that this album is named after the song in which he claims to have encountered God, during which he at one point gets pinned down, unable to move, as the "dogs of hell" dare him to give up. I had my own version of this in 2009 when demons ("dogs of hell") pinned me down and starting attacking me, and the only way out was to call out to God for help. i believe this album is like snapshots of his life around this event, and this particular song is an internal battle between him believing in heaven, but also doubting whether or not it's real for him. one of the greatest songs ive ever heard. no doubt |
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