| System of a Down – Bounce Lyrics | 2 years ago |
| POGO is a nonprofit in the US that investigates waste, fraud, and abuse in the US Government. Because of them, the gov't was forced to admit Area 51 exists. In the 90s they went after big oil's relationship with the Dept. of Interior. | |
| System of a Down – ATWA Lyrics | 11 years ago |
| You forgot to mention that Manson refers to his nature-based redemption organization as Atwa. | |
| Pearl Jam – Black Lyrics | 11 years ago |
| Pretty much most of the album Black Sheep Boy by Okkervil River. Especially the song So Come Back, I Am Waiting. Also the song On Tour With Zykos on the album The Stand-Ins. | |
| The Mountain Goats – Ezekiel 7 and the Permanent Efficacy of Grace Lyrics | 11 years ago |
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Hi Lauren! You wouldn't happen to be the person I sang Dance Music with before the show in Boston? His jam with Wurster at the end of the song was awesome in the original definition of the word. |
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| Everclear – Local God Lyrics | 11 years ago |
| Awesome analysis. | |
| Okkervil River – Plus Ones Lyrics | 11 years ago |
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Sheff lifts a line from an old Chet Baker song in Plus Ones. The song "Let's Get Lost." "Let's get lost, let them send out alarms," is from Chet Baker, though the rest of that stanza is original Sheff work, riffing off of the original material. |
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| The Mountain Goats – Age of Kings Lyrics | 12 years ago |
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I agree with you, I just wanted to add that the sword is in the waiting stone, still warm. Somebody tried to pull it out, and failed. The sword in the stone metaphor is that the chosen one will be able to effortlessly lift the sword from the stone, and someone in this song is clearly not the chosen one. This all happens in the lost age, which suggests that this song refers to an event that happened a long time ago. I'm not sure I agree that the person is dead. |
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| The Tallest Man on Earth – Love Is All Lyrics | 12 years ago |
| I agree wholeheartedly with your interpretation, really great work! | |
| Lost In The Trees – Fireplace Lyrics | 12 years ago |
| I think he says "forgive me" not "forget me". | |
| Caleb Orion – The Statue Lyrics | 13 years ago |
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"He would believe, but yet is still in pain, And tries his Argument of Sense again, Presses the Pulse, and feels the leaping Vein. Convinced, o'erjoyed, his studied Thanks and Praise, To her who made the Miracle, he pays: Then Lips to Lips he joined; now freed from Fear, He found the Savour of the Kiss sincere: At this the wakened image oped her Eyes, And viewed at once the Light and Lover, with surprise." - Pygmalion and the Statue by Ovid trans. by John Dryden |
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| Caleb Orion – Colors I've Never Seen Lyrics | 13 years ago |
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I saw her across the room, I had to get a better view, She eyed me like I was fire, And I saw something to aspire to. |
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| Caleb Orion – Some Set Of Teeth Lyrics | 13 years ago |
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"'Grandmother, what big teeth you have got!' 'All the better to eat you up with.'" - Le Petit Chaperon rouge by Charles Perrault |
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| Caleb Orion – Hearing Completely Correctly Lyrics | 13 years ago |
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"It was good that God kept the truths of life from the young as they were starting out or else they'd have no heart to start at all." - All The Pretty Horses by Cormac McCarthy |
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| Caleb Orion – Ladybugs Everywhere! Lyrics | 13 years ago |
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"What is flirtatiousness but an argument that life must go on and on and on?" - Jailbird by Kurt Vonnegut |
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| Caleb Orion – Discuss Lyrics | 13 years ago |
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"Something did happen to me somewhere that robbed me of confidence and courage and left me with a fear of discovery and change and a positive dread of everything unknown that may occur." - Something Happened by Joseph Heller |
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| Caleb Orion – The Numbers Song Lyrics | 13 years ago |
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"But the rest are even scared to open up and laugh. You know, that's the first thing that got me about this place, that there wasn't anybody laughing. I haven't heard a real laugh since I came through that door, do you know that? Man, when you lose your laugh you lose your footing." - One Flew Over The Cuckoo's Nest by Ken Kesey |
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| Caleb Orion – Vidamo Sei Leyonan Lyrics | 13 years ago |
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"He was still too young to know that the heart's memory eliminates the bad and magnifies the good, and that thanks to this artifice we manage to endure the burden of the past." - Love in the Time of Cholera by Gabriel GarcÃa Márquez |
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| Caleb Orion – Carthage Is Burning Lyrics | 13 years ago |
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Sitting alone on his bed, Two voices call out in his head. One is a longing to touch, The other says, "This is too much." |
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| Caleb Orion – Three Best Friends Lyrics | 13 years ago |
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"'And let me add,' said the Principal, 'that we always teach the science of relationship in conjunction with the ethics of relationship. Balance, give and take, no excesses---it's the rule of nature and, translated out of fact into morality, it ought to be the rule among people.'" - Island by Aldous Huxley |
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| Caleb Orion – A Rafting Song Lyrics | 13 years ago |
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It took away all the uncomfortableness and we felt mighty good over it, because it would a been a miserable business to have any unfriendliness on the raft; for what you want, above all things, on a raft, is for everybody to be satisfied, and feel right and kind towards the others." - Adventures of Huckleberry Finn by Mark Twain |
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| Josh Ritter – Labelship Down Lyrics | 13 years ago |
| We don't need record labels to have music. | |
| 13ghosts – Beyond The Door Lyrics | 13 years ago |
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Thanks, I've corrected them. This whole album is absolutely beautiful and underrated. |
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| Interpol – Pioneer to the Falls Lyrics | 13 years ago |
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I think someone's pregnant. "three stowaways" the two people and the baby? "vanish with no guile and i will not pay" if you leave me, i'm not paying to take care of it "well its still pretty wet with all these leaks" their relationship isn't perfect "safe and inside - alive" the baby "in a passion, it broke" the condom? "i pull the black from the grey, but the soul can wait" i'm a pessimist about things, but i will be patient |
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| The Long Winters – Delicate Hands Lyrics | 14 years ago |
| For some reason this song always makes me imagine a person drowning another person, "Last time we crossed I held you under wanting to feel you wanting to breathe." That somehow they get off on the idea of the other person struggling to breathe. | |
| Okkervil River – Title Track Lyrics | 14 years ago |
| Or Shannon Wilsey. | |
| Okkervil River – No Key, No Plan Lyrics | 14 years ago |
| Sheff seems like the type of person who would refer to what he does as "drug dealing." | |
| Josh Ritter – The Curse Lyrics | 14 years ago |
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My angle is more of a metaphorical one. The mummy represents the entertainer, and the woman represents love. At first she finds him while nobody else knows about him, and she nurtures his role as an entertainer and helps introduce him to people. As he grows, and more and more people know him, he starts traveling with her, but the more he travels and the more people know about him, the harder it is for him to be with her. Now she's just become another thing that represents his entertainer image, "just one more rag now he's dragging behind him." Eventually, she dies because he stopped nurturing her like she nurtured him. |
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| Okkervil River – In A Radio Song Lyrics | 14 years ago |
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"What shall he have that killed the deer? His leather skin and horns to wear. Then sing him home. (The rest shall bear this burden.) Take thou no scorn to wear the horn. It was a crest ere thou wast born. Thy father’s father wore it, And thy father bore it. The horn, the horn, the lusty horn Is not a thing to laugh to scorn." ~ As You Like It by William Shakespeare |
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| Ambulance LTD – Anecdote Lyrics | 14 years ago |
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Going along with what thelama was saying... (I know, earlier I said it was about Heroin, but I'm really digging this possibility) I think it's more than one girl, I think the guy in question is a player. He picks up these girls, thinking maybe they're the one for him, but then he's always disappointed. Probably due to the fact that he nets them with falsity, rather than being honest with them and himself. The reason I think it's more than one woman is that he says "You take the first one for free, and pass it on to me." He dates these girls, breaks their hearts, and then gives them to his friend. I wouldn't take the "pin the medals to your chest" bit too literally, as in, going out all mocked up to look good. They want to have a certain presentation. |
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| Josh Ritter – Mind's Eye Lyrics | 14 years ago |
| I like to think of this song as another Historical Conquest i.e. a song about a woman. It's an aggressive kind of situation, for sure. | |
| Josh Ritter – Come And Find Me Lyrics | 14 years ago |
| It's after the relationship is over, and they're remembering all their favorite bits, "Though I'm here in this far off place, my air is not this time and space," wishing their ex-lover would come back, "I didn't know that it was home 'til you up and left." The singer is saving themselves for the person they're remembering in the previous verses, "And I keep me in a vacant lot," wanting the ex to come back and make everything better again, "Hoping you will come and untangle me one of these days." | |
| Okkervil River – On Tour with Zykos Lyrics | 14 years ago |
| Also, the emphasis on "Broken" rather than "sign." | |
| Okkervil River – Pop Lie Lyrics | 14 years ago |
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Love the line, "So, here's the car seat, so cruelly weighted," because this song sounds just like a Cars song, right down to the grungy, warbly synthesizer and the palm-muted guitar that leaps in at the end of every line. I truly believe that the last line is "this song," mostly based on intonation. If he meant "his song" he would be making a z sound at the end of his. The other reason I think this is that he would be saying "this song is no different, and I'm fully capable of telling a Pop Lie, too." In fact, I would go so far as to say this song isn't about our supposed liar at all, I would say it's about the people who listen to the song and end up living their lives around it. They are completely remiss to the true nature of the liar. The last two albums have been full of songs regarding fans and entertainers and the interaction between the two, so it's not much of a stretch to connect this to something like Girl In Port or On Tour With Zykos (which offers a direct connection to the last verse of this song). There are people who build their worlds around entertainers like Sheff. |
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| The Mountain Goats – Deuteronomy 2:10 Lyrics | 14 years ago |
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Each self is an endangered species. It's no mistake that he takes the first person to refer to each of the three extinct animals, rather than referring to them as a collective of a species. |
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| The Mountain Goats – 1 Samuel 15:23 Lyrics | 14 years ago |
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i think the song is about john himself, selling his albums as "self-help tapes." and i believe "shining crystals" is a metaphor for the reflective surface of a compact disc, and with the amount of music john has released over the years, you could certainly call it a supply! i imagine those that listen to his music identify a lot with the echoes of internal ache in his song lyrics. "all sad faces at my window, i would welcome them inside" i especially enjoy the line, "there's more like me where i come from, so mark our shapes" |
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| Primus – Is It Luck? Lyrics | 15 years ago |
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Just thought I'd mention... The graham cracker was invented to stave off sexual urges, including the urge to masturbate. |
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| 13ghosts – Beyond The Door Lyrics | 15 years ago |
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Correction: Not "Wallow in fear" he says "The horror and fear" |
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| State Radio – Keepsake Lyrics | 15 years ago |
| I wish this song was like fifteen minutes longer. | |
| State Radio – Keepsake Lyrics | 15 years ago |
| I wish this song was like fifteen minutes longer. | |
| Page France – The Ruby Ring Man Lyrics | 15 years ago |
| I think this song is about becoming an atheist, or at least divesting yourself from Christianity. There's references to evolution (tails, I know it's an old idiom, but I can't help but wonder), hanging upside down in a famous tree (the tree of knowledge from Genesis?), "twisted" afterlives, and the fact that the ruby ring man ignores him (and who is later revealed to be Christ). | |
| Page France – Mr Violin And Dancing Bear Lyrics | 15 years ago |
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I think this song is about self-awareness and thinking too much, probably from growing out of childhood into adolescence. Each verse starts with this really beautiful thing about Mr. Violin or Mr. Dancing Bear, but then he talks about his big thoughts, and those big thoughts are actually fairly dark when you separate them out. What if the sun drops, or your heart stops? I'm pretty sure the last line isn't a reference to inbreeding, but rather a reference to Genesis and the apple. When you bite from the tree you become self-aware, hence a crookeder you and me. All of this happened in the old family tree, as opposed to the new family tree. |
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| Okkervil River – Title Track Lyrics | 15 years ago |
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I've thought a lot about what I think this song means, and I think it's about celebrity and popular media. Especially the last verse, which reminds me a lot of the situation that I kept hearing about involving Britney Spears. Everyone seemed to be talking about what she was up to, what she was doing, there was a lot of bad language being thrown around about her (is it still that way?). I'd go on, but I'm having trouble making the case for it from what I understand in my head. |
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| The Residents – Life Would Be Wonderful Lyrics | 16 years ago |
| The song title depends on what version of the album you purchased, the name was changed, so one is certainly more correct than the other, but they are both right. | |
| The Residents – Demons Dance Alone Lyrics | 16 years ago |
| On a more general level, I think the idea of this song is that no matter who you are, your demons are your own and no one else's. | |
| The Residents – Betty's Body Lyrics | 16 years ago |
| I want to know why the protagonist's Mother's death keeps him specifically from Betty. | |
| The Residents – Wolverines Lyrics | 16 years ago |
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I would most likely agree with the second interpretation, it's in the Three Metaphors section, and while your first thought had some good metaphorical thinking, the second is a metaphor in the sense of the entire song. Also, the line "I didn't do it, so you'll let me leave won't you?" in the beginning is chilling when you consider that there are still people being held without trial and without knowing what they're being held for. |
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| The Mountain Goats – Marduk T-Shirt Men's Room Incident Lyrics | 16 years ago |
| The line "I let myself imagine she was you" is the most haunting bit in the entire song, for me. | |
| Mike Doughty – Unsingable Name Lyrics | 16 years ago |
| I always thought it was unsingable because her name didn't rhyme with anything. | |
| The Mountain Goats – Autoclave Lyrics | 16 years ago |
| it's alright | |
| The Long Winters – Nora Lyrics | 16 years ago |
| This song reminds me of Henrik Ibsen's A Doll's House. In the play, there is a woman named Nora who decides to leave her husband Torvalds. There's a lot that doesn't match up with the play, but it's significant enough that I think of the play every time I hear this song. | |
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