| Bon Iver – Blindsided Lyrics | 2 years ago |
|
@[llscience:46131] Yea this is exactly what I've always thought the song was about. It's pretty clear he discovers tragic that he wasn't expecting, hence the title of the song. It's also pretty clear from the bridge (Would you really rush out), that the discovery involves a person who he wonders whether or not they care for him anymore. I think the end is a bit more harrowing than you described, though just is just my interpretation. It sounds like he's hanging himself off a dock to me. "taut line, down to the shoreline" would be the rope he's on. "The end of a bloodline" is self-explanatory and "the moon..." is painting a grim picture of him being there at night. "there's a pull to the flow, my feet melt the snow" i would guess refers to gravity's pull on his blood flow, down to his feet which are therefore warmed and thus melt the snow falling on them. Granted, why would he take his shoes off if it was snowing? don't know. But yea, brutal song either way. |
|
| The Mountain Goats – This Year Lyrics | 4 years ago |
|
Most of this song is straightfoward, and includes three clear themes: youth/freedom, cars/machines and alcohol. However, I think a lot of people missed the ending (and maybe I did too, this is merely my interpretation). The narrator wants to escape his home life with an abusive step-father. He does this both by drinking and by literally escaping the house. You can tell it's an "escape" rather than just a day out because of the lines: "I drove home in the California dusk I could feel the alcohol inside of me hum Pictured the look on my stepfather's face Ready for the bad things to come" The last verse, in a way similar to the ending of Ethan Frome, describes a crash without directly saying there was a crash. Having driven plenty of standard-transmission cars,I can tell you that if the engine gets stuck in gear and DOESN'T stall (The motor screaming out, stuck in second gear), means you are definitely still going forward, and fast. Combining this with the fact that his stepdad is going to be waiting for him and "The scene ends badly, as you might imagine," I think we can say that he hits and kills his step-father. Therefore the last verse lines make sense: "In a cavalcade of anger and fear..." in all the carnage in the immediate aftermath, the narrator realizes that now that his step-dad is dead "There will be feasting and dancing in Jerusalem next year." Being under 18, vehicular manslaughter might be about a year's worth of time in Juvenile Detention. |
|
| Bon Iver – Hey, Ma Lyrics | 4 years ago |
|
To me this sounds like the narrator is speaking to an individual with mixed morals (back and forth with light) or a dark heart but a light facade. The lyrics do reference light and dark a few times, as in the darkness of a coal mine and the darkness/light of dusk and dawn. My best guess is that the narrator is the customer of the subject, who deals drugs. The narrator begins each verse by waiting outside. He tokes on dope and he wants "mind sugar." In the final verse, the subject brings the narrator inside rather than having him wait outside, and reveals a dark secret, perhaps a truth that the narrator already knew, seeing as his previous interactions in previous verses made him "want a bath" and referenced "the past that he knew." Further evidence being that the narrator can't look the subject in the eyes during this seemingly long discussion. The money that the subject makes (and is constantly bragging about) is in a dark trade (living in a coal mine) and perhaps it's time to come clean, admit to the people he cares about (like his ma) that his money and lifestyle are not legit. Or perhaps he was caught / turned himself in and it's time to tell those he cares about that he's going to jail. The one line in this song I can't really reconcile is "Tall vote, you know you mope it up," I just don't see how it fits with my interpretation. But that's what I gleaned anyways. |
|
| Minus the Bear – Absinthe Party at the Fly Honey Warehouse Lyrics | 7 years ago |
|
I don't believe the interpretations from most of you who say the song is face-value, that it's just about getting smashed and having fun on vacation. I think it is lampooning MTB's view of the American tourist, which I personally agree with. Going bit by bit here: "Hey, let's cross the sea and get some culture Red wine with every meal And absinthe after dinner" We Americans equate high-culture with Europe, as if going there is all it takes to 'get some culture,' and as if drinking European liquor is somehow 'cultured.' The persistence of alcohol throughout the song really hammers home that that's what the vacation is all about, as if it's not something you can easily just do in your home town. Absinthe especially has buzz for Americans because absinthe with wormwood is illegal here. "We'd look good side by side, walking back to the hotel" The travelers are more concerned with our own image than the sights and sounds of the destination where they are vacationing. "We've got to get something, to eat and to drink yeah, and find a place to stay that's not far off the main way" Preoccupation with eating, drinking and tourist traps rather than attempting to actually discover the culture of the place they are visiting. "We've got to plan our day, Rodin and Orsay. And find a way to cram it all in, before we drink hard again." Again, 'cramming' in the tourist destinations, phrased here to make it sound like anything other than drinking is just an obligation or an afterthought. "Let's get a bottle and drink alone tonight" If this line isn't a giveaway that this isn't a happy-go-lucky song, I don't know what is. Finally, foregoing any pretense of enjoying the foreign country, its culture, or even communicating with foreign people, the travelers decide to isolate themselves and drink together. This clearly illustrates the absurdity of the American tourist. Why even go on vacation in the first place? "This light looks good on you, morning came early Sitting on a park bench that's older than my country" The tourists, still more focused on themselves and drinking in the park, are taken off guard by the how quickly morning comes, due to the time zone difference from the USA to France. "Two star hotel Near St. Germain. Two star hotel Where the stars don't mean anything." It seems the day they planned earlier in the song may be shot since they are drunk now. They instead decide to go back to their hotel. It's a lousy, two-star hotel, but the stars don't matter, because they are just going to pass out drunk anyways. So it seems that even the modest attempts of appreciating the foreign country are thwarted by the tourists' obsession with drinking, so much so that they forgot something so obvious such as time zones. Their vacation is truly pointless. |
|
| Led Zeppelin – When the Levee Breaks Lyrics | 10 years ago |
|
I still can't find the correct lyrics for this part, but I think it makes more sense if you don't include the separation that the music does. I mean, "Don't it make you feel bad when you're trying to find your way home? You don't know which way to go if you're going down south, then got no work to do if you're going north to Chicago" The flooding happened in the south, so navigation would be tough there, but not up north. I mean the odd phrasing makes me think I'm wrong, but take a listen yourself. Not sure about this but it makes more sense than the other transcriptions of this particular line that I've seen. |
|
| At the Drive-In – Metronome Arthritis Lyrics | 10 years ago |
|
This song is what they based the show "Breaking Bad" on. OK, maybe not, but hear me out. Verse 1 >Strike this match and let loose the oven's breath. Setting fire to something. >Up the volume that flirts with the UHF This one is a bit open-ended. UHF (ultra-high frequency) is most well-known as an older analog TV carrier signal, but it is also used in two-way radios. My thought is the person setting fires is increasing the power on some kind of jamming device to interfere with police/security radios. >Swipe the magnet on the audio tape Magnets destroy any data saved on tape. Clearly the singer is destroying what is most-likely evidence, and this is probably the point of setting the fires as well. >These arsons of grand larceny Yea, I'm going to go with that theory... He's covering up thefts, but of what? >Keep running keep running in place He's not gaining any ground. Despite the his efforts, there seems to always be more he has to destroy / cover up, possibly because the more he attempts to "clean" the more trails he creates for others to follow. >Achilles tendon severed from the race What he is doing is taking its toll and now has backfired on him. This confirms that by attempting to erase his trails, he just keeps creating new ones. This isn't interpreted from the song, but as an example, maybe during his fire-setting, he burns himself and now he has to explain that... Chorus 1 >Quick to the throat in this ink cartridge funeral More allusions to destroying evidence. In this case, it sounds like he is trying to prevent certain documents from being created that would otherwise indict him. These next lines are nebulous at best, so I need to set them up to explain them. Also note that I believe the "it" in the following third line doesn't actually exist (listen yourself). Anyways, here we learn that the singer is stealing drugs from his place of employment, which must be a pharmacy or a place where drugs are manufactured. Someone in this group had the insight that "marble caps lock" is like the writing on a tombstone, and think this is accurate. Zip code affiliate is this guy's partner, aka neighborhood drug dealer. This guy is the supplier and the zip code affiliate is his dealer. See what I mean? Walter and Jesse. So... >Marble caps lock zip code affiliate His drug dealer was killed, possibly by him... >You got a run on your pharmaceuticals, but his drugs are in high demand... >You better change before the night grows old So he better find another zip code affiliate. Verse 2 >Set the temperature on delete Burn the body, delete that evidence. Sorry Jesse. >Keep running keep running in place The repeat of this line and the next makes me think he had to kill his drug dealer. The more he tries to cover up, the more work he creates for himself, the more trails he has to cover. Killing his dealer prevented the leaking of some evidence, but now not only does he have to burn the body... >Let's hit the neighborhood today He's also gotta do all the selling himself too, presumably because he can't trust anyone anymore. Chorus 2 >You got a run on your pharmaceuticals Same thing as before, people want they drugs. >You better change before the night grows old However this time, changing refers not to changing dealers, but changing clothes... >Prescriptions filled, now cut your suit and tie cuticles He's got the supply now get out of those work clothes (suit and tie) and into the street clothes to start selling. Cuticles are organic protective structures, so here he is shedding his protection... >You cut your fingernails way too short ...but he's shed way too much protection and now is vulnerable. Cuticles are typically thought of as elements of the fingernail (in humans, at least), so here "fingernail" is kind of a metaphor for protection, and "cutting them short" is like "letting your guard down." bridge - outro >What if forensics finds the answers >What if they stole my fingerprints? >Where did I leave my book of matches? >We'll find you >We'll find you Pretty self-explanitory lines here. The song does a brief stint in the first person to get into the now-paranoid mind of the perpetrator, then goes back to the viewpoint of an observer, saying, "we'll find you." And finally, the song title is a reference to the difficulty over time of keeping up the precision necessary to operate such a dangerous and illegal scheme. It starts to be more and more painful and take even more effort to keep up with everything. Just my assessment. If anyone read all that, I'd love to hear your thoughts. |
|
| System of a Down – Violent Pornography Lyrics | 10 years ago |
|
I believe this song is about the first-world's delusion of life, twisted by television. If life were like the shows on TV, everybody living fucks, sucks cries and dies (in essence, lives crazy, fast-paced, drama-filled, action-packed lives). Crying and dying = violent, sucking and fucking = pornography, therefore television in general is a violent pornography. The Nabisco line is an allusion to the company's financial support, via advertizing, to the pornography industry. Disco rhymes with Nabisco, so I'm sure that's partially why it's used, but it is meant to reinforce the notion that life is one big party, or so TV would have you believe. And finally "brainwashing" just shows that band is trying to say "TV wants you to believe this is what real life is like, aspire to be a vapid celebrity, live by these rules and you will experience "the good life" when in reality you will become just a resource for the benefit of the elite, to be used up then discarded." also, come on SOAD fans, you are making the case for the need for comment moderation in a big way here. 110 comments, half of them are "wow, this song is so cool, my friends heard it now they like it." no one gives a shit, at all. 109 of you didn't even notice the "comment type," which i guess is serendipitous, because if i filter out "general comments" they all go away. |
|
| Sage Francis – Waterline Lyrics | 11 years ago |
|
This is what I think the lyrics are about. When I say something as fact, please interpret it as "I believe this is the case": >I just sit there and let the thoughts flood >And I remind myself it's all right, it's all good, it's all love >It's not though 'cause there's a kink in the armor >A pothole I'm sinking in while I think of the drama A man reflecting on his current situation, trying to stay positive, but realizing that something is wrong and needs to be dealt with, or perhaps cannot be dealt with. "it's all good, it's all love" usually is used in the context of a group of people, usually friends or family and fits the song's first theme of family. A kink in the armor implies a weak spot, as does a pothole in a street, the latter fitting the song's second theme of driving. The drama is the problem he is ruminating on. >So I stand up, start to pace in my living room >Set my eye to the highway knowing that I'll play chicken soon >There's a vanity plate with my name on it >There's a Davey Crockett hat with a Masonic fat cat under it First line is more reflecting, then back to the driving theme. The idea of playing chicken on the highway is him saying, "I'm about to knowingly drive to a potential disaster," and naturally this is an emotional and stressful endeavor. He continues and deepens the "playing chicken" metaphor by describing his opponent (which I'd expect to be a family member, almost definitely an older generation) as a masonic fat cat (controlling patriarch) with a raccoon hat (perhaps indicating traditional and/or conservative values, or an outdoorsy type of person). The car coming at the narrator also has a license plate with his name on it. I don't understand the significance of this, but maybe it's to emphasis the fat cat's control over the narrator (as in, the plate is a name for the car that the fat cat controls), or maybe it is to indicate that the fat cat uses the narrator himself against his own best interests (or maybe I'm wrong about this whole paragraph haha). >A musket rifle spitting at my feet >They want me to dance in the middle of the street >And I respect my elders, so I do as I'm told >But I offset the bell curve when I do it with soul, losing control This is a much more interpretable (yet still complex) verse. The musket is a second reference to frontier times and the 19th Century, so perhaps the narrator is struggling with his lineage. He is getting pressure to walk a particular line that his forefathers walked. Either way, back to the chicken metaphor, it seems as though the chicken game ended because narrator is now in the street. The idea of making someone dance by shooting at their feet is a classic reference to dominance and control. The use of "they" rather than "he" indicates that the perceived source of this pressure is coming from multiple people, reinforcing the thought that maybe this is a struggle against several older generations in his family. The narrator then verifies this with "my elders," and validates my theory about him struggling with defiance of family expectations with a brilliant, multi-layered second metaphor. Using the shooting/dancing metaphor to mean "being forced by his elders to follow one path", he adds the layer of "dance with soul" to indicate he instead chooses his own path (one of music/performance). This adds the element of a backfire on the elders, meaning that what they did to steer the narrator down their path actually further pushed him down a different one. Offsetting the bell curve is of course indicating taking the path less traveled. "Losing control" is a turning point in the narrator's experience (and indeed where the music swells, indicating that this is an important point), where the elders are losing control over his life. >Guilty feet do have rhythm, they just dance to >The wrong theme music to amuse the villain >Instead of killing, I'll spare the raccoon >And start filling sandbags as I stare at the moon >And let the thoughts flood The first line is about the narrator's internal struggle between living how he wants to live and not wanting to disappoint his family. Returning to his dance metaphor, the narrator reiterates that he is dancing to his own rhythm now, not the one that his elders (villains) would like. Sparing the raccoon is referring to the "Davy Crockett hat" from earlier, saying that he will not follow his elders' footsteps. The sandbags are a reference to building a dam and protecting against a flood, which in the very next line, he uses that word referring to extensive reflection. So here he is building up his mental defense against his family's persistant onslaught of attempts to persuade him into a different lifestyle, as well as his own internal guilt and anxiety over disappointing them. >Blessed are those who are (damned / dammed) when the levee broke >How many choked on the steps to a slow dance? >A staircase to a hug with no hands >Accountability hung out to dry on the line of command This verse is probably the most ambiguous. The first phrase is a clever play on words, meaning both a "meek shall inherit the Earth" sentiment (damned) as well as implying that it is wise to insulate one's self from harm (dammed). When the levee breaks refers to that very insulation breaking down and exposing the narrator to said harm. Then the narrator goes back to dancing, this time a slow dance. It seems to me that this is the turning-back point for the narrator. The levee breaking was his defense against his family failing and a slow dance is much more cooperative and in sync with others, meaning he has fallen back into their path, and lost his own (i.e. he has succumbed to the pressure they put on him and his own guilt ). The staircase is an oblique reference to Led Zepplin's stairway to heaven (seems to follow after the reference to "When the levee breaks"). In the Zep tune the stairway represents a path to fulfillment that people claim is righteous, but in fact leads to emptiness instead. Here, that staircase is promised to free him from their disapproval, and he finally climbs it, but he doesn't receive the love he was promised or expecting (hug with no hands). The last line invokes military or law enforcement themes, perhaps adding that as a dimention to his family, but reinforces that he didn't get what he expected when he traded his path for the one his family chose for him. >We let the thoughts flood >We remind ourselves it's all right, it's all good, it's all love >It's not though 'cause there's a kink in the armor >A pothole I'm sinking in, sharing a drink with my father >It's a family affair, the vanity we share A restatement of an earlier verse. This is to remind the listener that the age-old "truths" about family always being there and always supporting you are not always true. We can try to justify our personal sacrifices in the name of family being the ultimate safety net, but sometimes the sacrifice was too much and sometimes the net fails. "Sharing a drink with my father," verifies that the narrator did indeed give up his attempt at making his own life and invokes mutual sorrow. The last line here wraps it up by letting the listener know that the vanity is within his whole family. Vanity is being used in this case to mean "the need for acceptance and the concern for how other's judge you." The father doesn't want to be seen as some kind of pussy because his son is afraid to kill a raccoon and wants to spend his life dancing, and the son doesn't want his whole family judging him for these reasons. Now they are both miserable, and left to reflect until death on how they both couldn't make one another happy, hence... >The waterline is rising, and all we do is stand there. This is a powerful ending, repeated to increase its impact. Water and flooding is used earlier in the song as metaphors for both thought and pressure. This line ties those metaphors together, and can be interpretted as, "Despite all the pressure we feel and all of the self-reflecting we do when something is wrong, we never take action to improve things." In this specific song, the waterline is what overcomes the narrator's view of his path to happiness. Your path is so obvious at first and when you look back, it would have been so easy to just start walking that direction because the waterline was so low. As the waterline rises (the pressures from your family increase), your own thoughts become more paralyzing and that path becomes both obscured and more difficult to physically move towards. Finally, you are overcome by the water and resign to your position, essentially drowning in your thoughts of regret. Ouch. Amazing lyrics to an amazing song. It sucks that it's so short, but I wouldn't want it changed. |
|
* This information can be up to 15 minutes delayed.