| The Beatles – Fixing a Hole Lyrics | 27 days ago |
| Seems to me Paul's having a go at the people who claim to be open-minded, but close themselves off to discussion and forms of social discourse. Could apply to a few politicians at the time I'd imagine | |
| R.E.M. – Welcome To The Occupation Lyrics | 9 months ago |
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I think 'hemisphere below' can be East/West as well as North/South, because I'm seeing a lot of allusions to Vietnam in this song. The US has never really 'fired on' Central/South America, but they really unloaded on SE Asia. Conscription is Congress 'offering the educated' to the war effort; 'Hang your collar up' is them having to give up their day jobs, 'hang your dollar on me' references the cost of the war effort. The 'forest for the fire' is deforestation via napalm; 'held and dyed and skinned alive' is the history of POW treatment in SE Asian wars. Sugar, coffee cup, copper, steel are all things that the US needed to source from the developing world in this era, and hence the real point of much of the conflict that they either started or got involved in. About the song, well it's one of their best IMO, even more so considering none of the lyrics rhyme! |
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| R.E.M. – Begin The Begin Lyrics | 1 year ago |
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Looking for the land of plenty, the Pilgrim Fathers gave the English the flick ('Birdie in the hand for life's rich demand') and set themselves up in the New World ('I looked for it and I found it, Miles Standish proud, congratulate me') bringing their Calvinist beliefs ('Let's begin again like Martin Luther Zen") and practices ('A philanderer's tie, a murderer's shoe') with them, which formed the basis for a political system ('the mythology begins the begin') based on unthinking submission ('Follow the leader, run and turn into butter', 'Silence means security, silence means approval') and the power of the wealthy elite ('supply in the hand of the powers, the only vote that matters'). Hence, I think the title's a reference to a beginning which was in many ways a continuation. |
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| The Strokes – New York City Cops Lyrics | 3 years ago |
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I think there's a risky business style scenario going on in this song, but with a few tweaks. As others have said, he's bought a hooker back to the apartment for a night, but lets her stay a while as he feels sorry for her, at one point even thinking he should leave town before he becomes a pimp. Yes, I'm leaving, 'cause it just won't work And they act like Romans [tyrants], but they dress like Turks [carpet baggers] She's on the run as well, and so "every night she just can't stop saying New York City cops [are everywhere] but they ain't too smart" So he's caught "somewhere in between" |
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| Pavement – Stop Breathing Lyrics | 4 years ago |
| "Dad they broke me." Mostly I think lyrics are written around variations of being "broke", whether it\'s being sued ("war in the courts"), losing a game in tennis ("never held my serve"), or being injured on the battlefield ("no one wakes up"), and in all cases it helps to remain calm, and "stop, breathe in", just like your Dad taught you to. But also in war the aim is keep breathing, which is ultimately what I think the song\'s about--your life flashing before your eyes--hence the emotive-then-spooky outro. A great, amazing song. | |
| The Clean – Thumbs Off Lyrics | 7 years ago |
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The third verse is pretty tough to make out, but from what I hear and from the flow of the story, I'd guess it goes a little more like this: He turned to his friends but they turned away "you'll only make us older" He said c'mon, c'mon let's jol I think you'll do your shoulder They left him alone sitting on the road You know his head was full of garble Her voice was just clear as you and I know And that day he hit the wall |
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| Pixies – Something Against You Lyrics | 9 years ago |
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“Here we go.” Yep. I’ve always thought the track sequencing on Surfer Rosa left something to be desired, and it’s mainly because this song early on at track 3 is really the rejoinder to the rest of the album, the song in which all the lies (Bone Machine), frustration (River Euphrates), self-deception (Gigantic), suffering (Break My Body, and a few others) and cognitive dissonance (Where Is My Mind) congeal into a singular Old Testament-style retributive rage so intense that in the end it gives way to psychosis (and thus the cycle of suffering begins again). Probably to my mind more hard core than Husker Du, more metal than Metallica, whatever you’re feeling after listening to this, you’re likely feeling it with a gusto (and I know some who hate it). And that’s the general idea I guess. |
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| David Bowie – Lazarus Lyrics | 10 years ago |
| Just a guess but I suspect Bowie is in imagined dialogue with his greatest idol and fellow glam rock auteur Lou Reed in this song. Mention of New York and bluebirds (see "Candy Says" by The Velvet Underground) seem more than coincidental to me. | |
| Sonic Youth – Disappearer Lyrics | 11 years ago |
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I’ve never given much thought to what might be going on in these lyrics but reading them now 20+ years later they seem quite a lot deeper than I’d ever considered. In fact there’s quite a bit in this song to suggest it could be about the religious experience, and what someone might experience when they contemplate God in an Eastern mystical sense from the view of a dingy New York apartment... So there’s mention of meditation... "I'm back in, time to stay... Into the eastern, silent way" And chanting/ prayer... "Now it's a singing song..." "Been playing on a, simple rhyme..." And someone departed/transformed to become 'it" "It's been a man and gone..." "It turns to me and, it turns to gold..." (who could well be the Buddha... statues of the Buddha are often gold) And in many forms of Eastern thought God is within you, thus the mirror... "Ghost arise to, dirty mirror" And finally what seems like a lament for the decline in the popularity of the compassionate religions of the East, only briefly popular in the West in the 60s... "You've been away too long It's been way too long An eastern star is on A disappearer" And even the guitars in the intro sound like tolling bells! Amazing. |
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| Father John Misty – Hollywood Forever Cemetery Sings Lyrics | 13 years ago |
| Yep excellent song. My 2c it's about people who act like they love you only to desert you when you really need them. They're really just not worth it are they? | |
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