Breaking Into Heaven

this song can be summed up in the last few lines "You don't have to wait to die You can have it all Anytime you want it Yeah, the kingdom's all inside"

christianity and all other religions are flawed logicaly, and are mythical fabrications passed on through our societies. Your one and only chance in reaching "heaven" is during your time on earth. Never forget that and go live ur life to the fullest right now!

Weelllll, it's not necessarily a rejection of faith, spirituality, or religion but of those who try to control you through them. They can't barricade your way to heaven. You have all you need within yourself to attain salvation/nirvana/paradise.

Far from rejecting religion, the Stone Roses use lots of religious and specifically Christian imagery. It's kinda hard to miss: Something's Burning ("I am the vine/you are the branches"), Love Spreads (all about the Crucifixion), I Am the Resurrection, She Bangs the Drum (she'l be the fist/she'll be the last - I am the alpha and the omega), Where Angels Play (a lot Breaking Into Heaven)

In several songs, they use a female image for Jesus... "Love spreads her arms/waits there for the nails..." and the chorus "The Messiah is my sister/ain't no king, man/she's my queen"

I think I read somewhere about why 10 years ago when Second Coming (oh, yeah that one too) was released, but I forget now...

I wasn't making the s up. You're right they did a lot of drugs but grew out of that. In the end the thing that they rejected was the hard drugs , but too late. Read their own words from an interview in Melody Maker May 13th 1995: MANI (unprompted): "Good Times is just a focus on what's happenin'. Everyone's on smack. Fin' up."

Mani you said recently that 14 of your friends had died in the last year because of heroin. Is that true?

MANI: "Not any more. It's 15 now. Another one went last week -methadone. It's a scourge, man. A f***in' waste." ... John, there were reports in a US tabloid that you'd had a serious problem with cocaine during the making of Second Coming. Correct? (Mani and Ian shuffle uneasily in their chairs.) JOHN (staring at the table): "Yeah. I did too much." How serious was the problem? (Cue distracting noises from Ian and Robbie.) JOHN: "It made me anti-social." .... It has been suggested that the sessions were typified by bouts with heavy drugs, depression, rows, laziness and incompetence. How far is this true? IAN: "True… but with a lot of hard work in the end." ...and finally... There's always been a lot of religion in the Stone Roses music, from the lyrics of Resurrection to the title 'Second Coming' and the imagery on Driving South. Why do you take so much from The Bible?

JOHN: "It's unconscious. Resurrection was Ian's and Second Coming, that's public domain, innit? I thought it was cocky and tongue-in-cheek at the same time."

IAN: "I read The Bible whenever it takes me. I read Exodus a lot during the Gulf War, when we were recording in Wales. It hit home cos here was this rich family who was bringing the biggest army in the world to kill poor people. We couldn't do anything to stop it."

Could God have done something to stop it?

IAN (thoughtfully): "Yeah. God's creative, not destructive. God is a creation."

One thing I particularly liked about Love Spreads were the lyrics "The Messiah is my sister", which sound really innocuous when you hear them on the radio but in fact you're questioning thousands of years of Christianity by saying that. It's a casually controversial thing to have in a pop song.

IAN: "I don't see it as controversial."

Tell that to the Pope!

IAN: "Well, if you read the Dead Sea scrolls, they tell you that Mary Magdalene gave Him his power."

ROBBIE: "Do you know what The Bible calls the church? 'She'. It's like what The Bible calls the earth, 'Mother Earth'."

Maybe, but it's always been written that God/Jesus was a Him. You could be on the brink of a major religious and political storm here, with people - in Italy or Ireland say - burning records in the street like they did with The Beatles!

JOHN: "The idea of the song is, 'Why couldn't Jesus have been a black woman?' It's just an attack on the white guy with a beard sittin' on a cross, cos that reinforces the patriarchal society."

Personally, this song always seemed to be about suicide. I've had this arguement enough times. Breaking into heaven itself seems like a euphemism. Ending life early and getting into heaven on your own terms. "I'm gonna break right into heaven I can't wait anymore"

Sorry, know this post is a year too late but just writing to agree with mattp, citid's explanation is way too simple minded. Personally believe most of Stone Roses's HEAVY use of religious imagery was just for effect, certainly on John's part but Ian has always declared himself (in his own way) a believer. There is an interview in NME where the journo asks him why there is so much religion in there and he just holds up the crucifix he is wearing and says 'why do you think i wear this? i'm a believer man'. Just not true to say roses rejected any religion but hard drugs.

Great song especially the version on the very best of the stone roses compilation as the version on the second coming is far too long at the begining. I think the lyrics portray the devil in which he or she is trying to break into heaven and completley dominate it. The line 'Heaven's gates won't hold me I'll saw those suckers down' indicates this.

He's so high, feels like hes 'breaking into heavan'

amazing song, one of thier best

isaved chip has a point, with that line "Had a line of my dust..." Never thought about the suicide aspect, deadite. That sounds ok up until the last verse where he says, "you don't have to wait to die... The kingdom's all inside."

not suicide.

but i like the outside the box thinking. Ian is to positive for that, no?