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The Devil You Know Lyrics
A life to call our own
That is ours alone
Is as hard as hell to come by these days
Time that I took what`s mine, took it now
Things aren`t what they where, they`re what they are
There`s no time of our own
And the devil you know is the only one
Is time too fast for us to grasp something of our own?
The ghost of the past has its arms around me
It moves everywhere in all I hear and see
And the devil you know is the only one
Look at you now, look at you then, see how you will be
All of your life belongs to me
Things aren`t what they where, they`re what they are
There`s no time of our own
And the devil you know is the only one
That is ours alone
Is as hard as hell to come by these days
Time that I took what`s mine, took it now
There`s no time of our own
The ghost of the past has its arms around me
It moves everywhere in all I hear and see
All of your life belongs to me
There`s no time of our own
Song Info
Submitted by
wumpscut.angel On Jun 05, 2002
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It seems to me this is about seizing the moment before life passes you by. The devil he's singing about may be the routine people so often fall into in daily life.
The first line should read "A life to color our own", which is why there is all of that paint in the video.
The title and the chorus, "the devil you know is the only one", are a loose translation of the phrase "Honi soit qui mal y pense". The literal translation is close to "evil to him who thinks evil", but here it is used a little more forcefully: the 'devil' doesn't make you do anything, when you do bad things it's not because there is a Devil out there tempting you, it is because YOU decided it was okay to do those bad things... the devil inside you, the "devil you know", is the only devil there is, i.e. "is the only one". In other words, quit trying to pass off the blame for your actions.
Interestingly this creates a double meaning for the line "It's time that I took what's mine"... in one sense it is a bad act that he is about to commit, which the chorus reminds him is entirely his choice, but in another it could be him saying "it's time for me to acknowledge that I and I alone have done these bad things".
Awesome song.
The title and chorus reference the aphorism, "Better the devil you know than the devil you don't," which refers to people's tendency to stick with what's familiar and routine to them, no matter how bad or unsatisfying, rather than risking a change towards the unfamiliar and whatever unknown, new "devils" that could bring. "The devil you know is the only one" means that there's nothing to fear in risking the unknown if your life already seems bad enough that it may as well be ruled by a devil, however familiar and predictable his ways; there is no worse devil than the one you've already been dealing with for too long.