| Saul Williams – Grippo Lyrics | 11 years ago |
| I think "substitute the anger and aggression with guilt and depression and it's yours" within the context of "white boys" participating in hiphop could be a statement about how mainstream hiphop may have started as something that in part gave voice to the frustrations of the Black experience at the time of its conception, where "guilt and depression" can be associated with the concepts of White guilt and anxieties perceivably pertinent to the [far more privileged] White experience. | |
| The Tallest Man on Earth – Love Is All Lyrics | 13 years ago |
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I think that in the first expression, he's talking about discarding something troublesome into the current while trying maybe to focus on the positive. In the second instance, he's including his [former] loved one in the things he discards into the current. He has given up on love and returned to what is true of him. Perhaps it's a betrayal on his part. Whatever it is, it's very pessimistic and familiar. The current, to me, is the amorphous and troubling place within him where he deals with, or simply stores, all of his problems |
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| The Tallest Man on Earth – Love Is All Lyrics | 13 years ago |
| I... I truly hope this comment is just really good performance art. | |
| The Tallest Man on Earth – Love Is All Lyrics | 13 years ago |
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This song has become a bittersweet addiction to me. My read on "Love is All" seems to deviate from what most of you are saying. Here's hoping that doesn't make me dumb! I think the song is from the perspective of a person struggling with either an intelligent sociopathy or mild psychopathy. He tries being a valid and innocuous member of society, but with little sustained success. He's introspective and currently in touch with some of his empathy before losing it again. He's experiencing the last moments of the the calm before another period of mental turmoil. Perhaps my interpretation does overlap with those of you who are saying it's about a breakup. I think perhaps the song is being sung to the one person who was able to help him think he could be better, but no longer has that ability as he becomes more consumed in his more real connection with hopelessness and destruction. - - - "I walk upon the river like it's easier than land" When he's trying to, accomplishing things that appear impressive is easier for this person than the simple day-to-day things he see others doing with ease. He gets credit for being an extraordinary individual, but struggles with what should be natural to him (connection, relationships, love). - - - "Evil's in my pocket and your will/strength is in my hand" He will always have it in him to be a bad person, but he's trying, hard, to be good because of the person he's singing to. - - - "Love is all, from what I've heard, but my heart's meant to kill" He has to take the best part of being human on faith because he does not experience the same joys everyone else seems to. What he feels is the darkness which makes him harmful. - - - "And now spikes will keep on falling from the heavens to the floor The future was our skin and now we don't dream anymore" We are disillusioned. We were idealistic and optimistic when we were young and inexperienced. Life is filled with more pain than we had realized. - - - "Like a house made from spider webs and the clouds rolling in I bet this mighty river's both my savior and my sin" His version of the security others have in a relationship/ties to others is flimsy and won't withstand his next period of depression or violence, which he feels coming on. Perhaps ending it all could be both his best and worst moves at once. - - - "And I'll throw it/you in the current that I stand upon so still" The current = violence and destruction, either physical or emotional. He can navigate situations where he is attacking, assaulting or destroying something without the madness of the action disquieting his mind. Stand upon so still = not phased by what he's doing/experiencing. Throwing it/you in the current = How he deals with the things that bring him struggle. The person he's singing to is no longer sacred by the end of the song, despite his/her former good influence. Where s/he may have tried to bring the singer over to the side where a normal life feels good, things have transitioned to a perspective wherein the singer destroying the person he's singing to could feel just as normal. - - - His submission to the crying is the most powerful part of this song to me. He doesn't try to control them because from his experience there's no way to stop them, even if he did understand them fully. Titling the entire narrative "Love is All" makes it sound even more hopeless, if truly he cannot feel any of it. If love is everything, and he cannot make himself feel love, he knows he exists and struggles for nothing. So sad, from my point of view. Thanks, Mr. Birbiglia. |
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| Snoop Dogg – Ain't No Fun (If the Homies Can't Have None) Lyrics | 14 years ago |
| Why are you even here? | |
| Snoop Dogg – Ain't No Fun (If the Homies Can't Have None) Lyrics | 14 years ago |
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Man... I came to this page hoping to see some real, thoughtful commentary on this song, mainstream hiphop & misogyny, sexuality in hiphop, and so on. Instead I found a bunch of short comments from some clearly smallminded dudes who are stuck in some other decade where the belief is that women are there for f*cking and nothing else. One of the most interesting things to me is the fact that so many young fans of rap share the SAME EXACT last-century bigotry that all the old people who hate rap grew up with. Good job. You guys should be friends. Really. |
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| Kanye West – Runaway Lyrics | 15 years ago |
| This interpretation makes the most sense to me. Very well-written. Thanks for not just connecting the two closest dots together and calling it meaning. | |
| Neutral Milk Hotel – In the Aeroplane Over the Sea Lyrics | 20 years ago |
| Dr. Panda 97, I think what you said makes the most sense out of that part of the song {"how I would push my fingers through your mouth"}, for me at least. | |
| Neutral Milk Hotel – Naomi Lyrics | 20 years ago |
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I'm in the same boat with those of you who feel the song is a little creepy. Every time "so pretty" is repeated it just makes me think of an obsession he has with a girl he feels he can't show affection for directly. I think I may subscribe the belief that Naomi is a prostitute. I was also thinking perhaps it's possible that she is just a young girl, someone he sees walking to school every day, and the "billion lovers" could be the social scene composed of many school friends she is enveloped in. If this is the case, perhaps he's afraid of the corruption of her innocence he is anticipating. I do think it is a little stalker-esque, but I don't think he means her harm. You can have an unhealthy obsession with someone to an extent that seems a bit disturbing without actually wanting to go too far. I think this is why the end of the song seems so pensive and wishful. This song stuck out to me. Mangum isn't as loud in this as he is in other songs, but it comes off as being just as intense emotionally. It's neurosis that is so poignant in this song. Neurotic lyrics paired with lazy vocals. It's both soothing and heavy, to me. Whatever the meaning, this is an incredibly beautiful song. Also, side note: The first few seconds of it reminds me a bit of the Pixies. |
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