| Alice in Chains – Sea Of Sorrow Lyrics | 1 year ago |
|
Personally, I think at least the following lines are about cocaine: "Lines cut across my face" - cocaine, when insufflated through the user's nose, is often on a mirror when it is cut up into lines ... therefore when you actually snort the drug, you will see the reflection of yourself doing so and it appears as if the lines are indeed cut across your face. |
|
| The La's – There She Goes Lyrics | 2 years ago |
|
I think it's unlikely that this song wasn't inspired by drugs in some fashion. Loads of bands write songs with obvious heroin/drug references in them, Nirvana being the go-to example, and then flat-out deny that they're there ... due to the bad press that writing songs glamorising drug use can have (the La's got a ton of grief for "There She Goes Again" for its possible heroin references), therefore it's common for bands to keep the true meaning of songs hidden. ''Racing through my brain'' - narcotics like heroin act quickly to give you euphoria by setting off various receptors in the brain. ''Pulsing through my veins" - self-explanatory ''I Just can't contain, this feeling that remains" - when coming down off heroin and other narcotics, you usually feel painfully sick, normally to the point of throwing up. "She pulls my train" - obviously pulling a train is a metaphor for sexual intercourse, but consider this; a slang term for intravenous drug injection is 'mainlining', ie. the mainline of a railway. Warren Zevon used a similar metaphor in "Night Time in the Switching Yard". ''No-one else could heal my pain'' - drugs and particularly heroin are often taken to relieve pain of some form, sometimes physical pain (Dimebag of Pantera used smack for back-pain, Kurt Cobain used it for his stomach ailments), sometimes emotional pain. |
|
| Bush – Straight No Chaser Lyrics | 2 years ago |
|
I think SNC is about Death. More specifically, reflecting on the death of someone close to you; both Nigel Pulsford and Gavin Rossdale of Bush had bereavements of relatives during the recording of Sixteen Stone (the album is dedicated to their passed loved ones), two years prior to the release of Razorblade Suitcase. It could also reference the suicide of Kurt Cobain, which was also concurrent with the release of Sixteen Stone. "Always be there, face I live with" - this is the protagonist addressing someone who has died, even though they're gone, part of them will never leave you "Drink life as it comes, straight no chaser" - he's reflecting on an unexpected death, you never know when circumstances will change drastically for the worse (death of someone you love, even your own death), so in the meantime, live every moment like there's no tomorrow, because there might not be. "Climb inside of you, away from strangers" - the world around you is strange and hostile, you just want to take comfort in the memory of the ones you loved. Assuming the death of Kurt Cobain was an influence on the lyrics, then this could reference the impact Cobain had on the protagonists life; his music were an escape for an introvert from the unfriendliness of the world around them. "It's all in the face of what we thought we knew before" - fairly literal, no matter what, you cannot be prepared for someone being alive one day, then dead the next. The world you knew will be all but dead. "Keep on driving" - no matter how hard grief, etc, is on your mental health, the protagonist is telling himself to keep on going "Hair left morning wet" - I think the other readings of this line are correct, and it kind of ties in with the "face I live with" bit, no matter what, similar to wet hair after a shower, a bit of the grief will always stick with you. "Nothing like losing you" - self-explanatory, and very much supports the "in the face of what we thought we knew" line. Nothing can even remotely prepare you for death, especially when its someone close to you, or whose life you value deeply. |
|
| Manic Street Preachers – Australia Lyrics | 2 years ago |
|
"Praying for the wave to come now, It must be for the fifteenth time" For years, I didn't read too much into the line, but it may be one of the deepest the Manics ever did. Clearly, "Australia" is about the aftermath of Richey Edwards disappearing the year before it was released. Now, as we know, Richey went missing near a tidal estuary on the River Severn, which has been the site of hundreds of suicides and attempted suicides. However, as Peter Hook from Joy Division told the Manics WRT Richey, "at least we had a body", referring to the suicide of his own bandmate Ian Curtis in 1980. For me, this line is Nicky praying that a wave will eventually bring in Richey's body, if for nothing else but to give closure to the band and others close to Richey. In the second line, we see Nicky losing faith in finding Richey's body, as he writes: "Praying for the wave to come now, it must be for the very last time [...] there must be someone to blame" Which clearly refers to the suspicion many around Richey had that foul play may be involved in Richey's disappearance. |
|
| Bush – Machinehead Lyrics | 3 years ago |
|
I personally have, or at least has, this song down as being about drugs - most likely heroin. I know not whether Gavin Rossdale has every actually been a heroin user or not, but several lines stand out to me as being clear references to the drug. "Tied to a wheel, my fingers gotta feel". I see the wheel metaphor as probably being like a hamster wheel, in the sense that he is tied to this drug which he can't escape from - and/or maybe like a hamster's wheel is a temporary relief from the entrapment of a cage, much as a drug would serve this purpose for somebody whose life is miserable and depressed. "My fingers gotta feel" comes off as a reference to his fingers gripping a syringe with which to inject heroin. "I felt you like electric light" To me this is a pretty blatant reference to the rapid onset of the effects of heroin. "For our love, for our fear For our rise against the years and years and years" At this point he seems to be listing reasons why he shoots up. "For our love", perhaps a lost or unrequited love? "For our fear", because there is something he fears and uses heroin to escape from it. "Rise against the years", perhaps he's mournful or regretful over misspent years of youth? "Got a machinehead" This one is a stretch, it could be from heroin being a not uncommon factor in the death of rockstars, and Rossdale was using the fact that guitars feature a "machine head" to reference this. |
|
| Strawberry Switchblade – Since Yesterday Lyrics | 5 years ago |
|
This song is very deep for its time, and very intelligent. Rose McDowell revealed in 2015 that this song was written about nuclear war - interpretations about relationships and suicide are seemingly erroneous - and seeing as it was recorded in 1983, that makes perfect sense because nuclear annihilation was the western world's paramount fear during the Cold War, a fear which intensified around the early-mid 1980s with the Soviet invasion of Afghanistan, so this 3 minute poppy number is absolutely a backdrop to the political and societal climate of the time. "And as we sit here alone, looking for a reason to go on" -- right out of the gates, sitting there "alone" implies that the narrator is of a small number of stray survivors following a destructive nuclear blast. I read that she is "looking for a reason to go on" because the explosion has laid waste to all she knew and loved, including those close to her, and she is trying to find a reason to carry on living. "It's so clear that all we have now, are thoughts of yesterday" -- this is another line seemingly written from the POV of somebody who has survived a nuclear blast. The world as she knew it has been obliterated by a nuclear explosion, her family, friends, etc, as implied above have presumably perished and all she's left with is memories of past times. |
|
| Bush – Swim Lyrics | 5 years ago |
|
I have for a while read "Swim", probably one of the darkest songs in the Rossdale sage, as being written from the point of view of a man who is in an abusive relationship with a female. I think that the relationship described in this song wasn't always abusive, and the protagonist wants back the personality of this woman when she first met her. "Could not believe, came here today, helmet was on, blew me away" -- the "helmet was on" part may reference the fact that the protagonist has become accustomed to violence from his girlfriend/wife becoming a normal part of his life. But he "could not believe" and "blew me away" suggest that the suffering was even greater than usual. "Came here today" simply narrates the routine of arriving home (i.e. from work, etc) and integrates the narrator's hardship into his normal life. "House was on fire, we're naked again" -- this is a pretty obscure and discordant lyric, but I agree with another commenter that this may be about being unable to resist the person, and I suggest "we're naked again" may be about copiously wanting to be intimate with the song's subject, but knowing it will cause danger, a la "house was on fire". "Maybe all we need, is water and friends" -- I am unsure about the "water" element to this (though water could extinguish the aforementioned "fire"), but I am exploring the possibility that being surrounded by "friends" may make the narrator's lover less abusive? Although this is a long-shot. "Thinning ice, 14 hairdryers" -- yet another lyric shrouded in mystery, although in my opinion it could, though this is a stretch to say the absolute least, represent his wish, to have this woman in his life without the routine abuse and violence, yet he acknowledges the sheer unlikelihood of this, and his optimism fading, much as ice would melt into water in the presence of hairdryers. "Flame on earth desire" -- this is a difficult lyric, but I think it may reference a contrast betwixt the enormity of the earth, but the tiny, yet fervent nature, of a flame. He passionately wants back the woman he fell in love with, or thought he did, before she became abusive, but it feels so insignificant and hopeless, like a tiny flame would to the earth. "This cripple's with you" -- I think this line may be the narrator acknowledging the injuries that he's endured at the hands of the song's subject, to the point that the narrator is now possibly even in some way handicapped (i.e "crippled"). It could have further connotations to the effect that even though he's been crippled by her, he still has strong feelings for her, and as such wishes to be "with" her. "If money talks, I want to buy you" -- I read this part as the protagonist speculating that if he suddenly became wealthy, achieving rockstar success, winning the lottery, would she cease her abuse of him? "I'm not scared of you, gave up on drugs" -- "I'm not scared of you" is a defiant statement by the narrator, saying he has no fear of this girl despite all that she has put him through, and by extension feeling he will get what he wants with her in the end. "Gave up on drugs", could relate to the above point, meaning either: that the narrator thinks giving up on drugs himself would impress her sufficiently to relinquish her abusive nature, or that her giving up on drugs may bring her into a more stable, and less abusive mindset. |
|
| Gary Jules – Mad World (Tears for Fears cover) Lyrics | 9 years ago |
|
A very interesting song. This is a big stretch, but I beleive in the first verse, the singer is in fact in a bar/pub, surrounded by 'familiar faces'. The reason they are at the pub is not for social interaction, but rather because they depressed/fed up with life. 'Worn out faces' further strengthens this point. 'Going nowhere' suggests repetition, and a lack of differentiation in the singer's life. 'Daily races', to me seems to refer to the singer's unchanging, bland and depressing day-to-day life. 'Tears filling up their glasses', suggests to me that the 'familiar faces' in the pub are in the same situation and are feeling fed up with life. The 'glasses' of course, refers to drinking glasses. 'Drown my sorrow', I have interpreted as 'drink away my sorrows'. 'No tomorrow' could simply suggest a lack of differentiation, but also could have a much darker meaning, in that the singer is 'drinking his life away' and is aware of it. As for the second verse, I'm still thinking!!!! |
|
* This information can be up to 15 minutes delayed.