Night on the Sun

I haven't figured out yet if this band is going to bring me back to life or put the final nails in my coffin.

Wrote this out while I had an epiphany regarding the meaning of this song - January 4th, around noontime. I was tweaking on Vyvanse and propylhexedrine during literature class (as I'm the scum of the earth, scourge of mankind), but nevertheless, this is, and will always be, my notion about this track. Here is exactly what I wrote, unedited, unaltered, no censorship. Here we go:

"Night on The Sun" is about reclusiveness. The title alone depicts the concept of an imposed (sometimes self-) loneliness. The line, ["Turn off the light cuz its night on the sun, & your hopelessly hopeless, our hopes are all for you"] that permeates the song details the idea of closing yr curtains, and the reactions of those around you. Isaac is trying to say "your friends give a shit". The idea of ["freeze yr blood & then stab it into me"] is reflecting how a recluse wants someone to come his way and help him out of his depressive pitfall {*Empathize w. him}. He then proceeds to write ["I eat my own blood & get filled up, I get filled up on me"], another piece that shows a reclusive (or at least avoidant) lifestyle - The narrator quits needing other people as company (hearken back to the -phenomenal- chorus of Baby Blue Sedan - "I'm never lonesome when I'm by myself"), and proceeds to make do with only himself and his mind for company, whether it be with drugs, terebii, Japanimation (Brock's waifu is Witch Hunter Robin), or anything. Last few lines of the song are both the most powerfully sung, and poignantly meaningful ["Well, there's one thing to know about this town, it's 500 miles underground! (It's alright...), well, there's one thing to know about this globe, it's bound & it's willing to explode (It's alright)"] The climax ends with something like "ain't nobody who wants me underground, which proves the Narrator (Isaac) accepts his friend's help. Good end?

----fin

For the record, this is probably one of my favorite songs, by my favorite band. Still don't have -the- favorite, but this is definitely on the list.

I know it may seem superficial...but this song truthfully in all forms and meanings saved my life.

nothing will ever quite go together as well as "Night on the Sun" and driving through the allhegeny mountian ranges in upper pennsylvania.

the ending lines to this song are very powerful. "its bound and its willing to explode" i don't know. the lines just get me. the meaning should be pretty obvious.

sometimes when it is a lazy sunday and i don't really know what to do and i don't want to think about work on monday, i put on this album on my headphones and go to a different place

Okay...I have not read all 93 comments. So, forgive me if I am posting something, someone else has already covered. However, I have been racking my brain on this song, and FINALLY feel like I have almost figured it out. Not that the suggestions above aren't good points to ponder, or that my perceptions aren't completely crazy!!! So, here we go... 'Freeze your blood and stab it into me...' I feel, here, blood is representing one's self or beliefs, and he is painting the picture that whomever he is talking to or about is trying his or her hardest to push their beliefs/self on him. HOWEVER 'I eat my own blood and get filled up on me...' Here, he is saying he is already full of himself, in the emotional sense of the phrase. So, he is his own person, basically. (however stubborn or narcissitic, he does or does not realize the statement to be) MOVING ON 'Well, there's one thing to know about this town; It's five hundred miles underground; and that's all right...' Here, he feels, he is living in hell. (underground) 'Well, there's one thing to know about this globe; It's bound and it's willing to explode...' Quite literal menaing, here... 'Well, there's one thing to know about this town; Not a person doesn't want me underground..." Here, underground obviously means dead. Everyone is out for themselves and could not and would not care if he was dead...kind of adding to the point of the to previous lines. 'There's one thing to know about this earth; We're put here just to make more dirt, and that's ok.' Here, he is realizing that WE are not the picture, rather a tiny part of what makes the world. WHICH BRINGS US TO THE BEGINNING LINES '...'cause it's NIGHT ON THE SUN.' This can be taken any number of ways...BUT I FEEL it's being said with a sarcastic tone, as THE SUN never has a NIGHT. It never has a darkside, because it is a ball of light. HOWEVER 'Turn off the light...' ...doesn't go very well, with my above theory. it could have something to do with humans killing the planet, with our whole energy wastefulness...which could tie it into the second part of the line. (Night on the Sun) 'You're hopelessly hopeless. I hope so, for you.' Pretty self explanatory, here...the main theme of the song...or at least the reason he is songing the song.

a great song, too bad its about raping a young child in vietnam after inhaling a whip cream can

Dudes, me and Isaac shoot up together, and this song isn't about that shit, he told me it was about a kung-fu movie he saw.

I think but don't know for sure the song is about Jesus... hahaha, well, Jesus eats his own flesh, since people in passover consume Jesus's flesh with bread (and wine?). I think I'm not sure, I just say this b/c I've never been through catechism and up until a year ago didn't know that Jesus was revered in some sort of ritual meal. It also fits that mold, where all people are god's children, and those who believe in jesus are inherently eating their own blood since they come from the same strand. Some jibber-jabber of such, but I think the tone is indicative of the speaker's attitude. Which is that Jesus is visicous and self-serving, loves himself more and inflicts pain upon people through robbing them of hope. Hope serves as a form of self-help and replaces the rules of religion, hope is really the individual's understanding that to keep living is an act of investing in what the future brings, the composite opposite of nihilism. When you think of religion, conquering hope, an illogical fallacy occurs and blinds you to what's really happending. In the lyrics, Brock is using Jesus giving him a voice that hopes the people hopeless so they will invest in him as their savior. Within this power of peoples faith, the narrator, Jesus, demonstrates his capacity to control the people, even the audience; he tells us
"Well, there's one thing to know about this town Not a person doesn't want me underground There's one thing to know about this town It's five hundred miles underground; and that's ok There's one thing to know about this earth We're put here just to make more dirt, and that's ok" Speaking in idioms, the narrator in the end communicates the sentiment that he is unwanted, the people undergound,or in hell, and the people are all without an essential purpose. Yet the ending of "Night on the sun" sends the contradition that flips the meaning, a contradication since in raw conception the sun gives day, creates it, and the abuse of what to think what to acutalize becaomes a surrealist hell of who to beleive; the attittde says don't beleive in Jesuss.

To me, this song seems oddly optimistic - when I hear the 'There's one thing you should know about this town / It's 500 miles underground / And that's okay!' line, it just seems like a very positive and life-affirming lyric. I'm probably wrong but that's my interpretation anyway. I suppose it's good that it and so many other Modest Mouse songs are vague in meaning - they can relate to any situation you're in, and that's another reason Modest Mouse are my favourite band.