I think much like another song “Anti-Matter” (that's also on the same album as this song), this one is also is inspired by a horrifying van crash the band experienced on Nov 3, 2022. This, much like the other track, sounds like it's an extension what they shared while huddled in the wreckage, as they helped frontman Garrett Russell stem the bleeding from his head wound while he was under the temporary effects of a concussion. The track speaks of where the mind goes at the most desperate & desolate of times, when it just about slips away to all but disconnect itself, and the aftermath.
And through the life force and there goes her friend
On her Nishiki it's out of time
And through the portal they can make amends
Hey would you say whatever we're blanket friends
Can't stop what's coming
Can't stop what's on its way
And through the walls they made their mudpies
I've got your mind I said
She said I've your voice
I said you don't need my voice girl
You have your own
But you never thought it was enough of
So they went years and years
Like sisters blanket girls
Always there through that and this
There's nothing we cannot ever fix I said
Can't stop what's coming
Can't stop what's on its way
Can't stop what's coming
Can't stop what's on its way
Bells and footfalls and soldiers and dolls
Brothers and lovers she and I were
Now she seems to be sand under his shoes
There's nothing I can do
Can't stop what's coming
Can't stop what's on its way
Can't stop what's coming
Can't stop what's on its way
And now I speak to you are you in there
You have her face and her eyes
But you are not her
And we go at each other like blank ettes
Who can't find their thread and their bare
Can't stop loving you
Can't stop loving
Can't stop what is on its way
And I see it coming
And it's on its way
On her Nishiki it's out of time
And through the portal they can make amends
Hey would you say whatever we're blanket friends
Can't stop what's coming
Can't stop what's on its way
And through the walls they made their mudpies
I've got your mind I said
She said I've your voice
I said you don't need my voice girl
You have your own
But you never thought it was enough of
So they went years and years
Like sisters blanket girls
Always there through that and this
There's nothing we cannot ever fix I said
Can't stop what's coming
Can't stop what's on its way
Can't stop what's coming
Can't stop what's on its way
Bells and footfalls and soldiers and dolls
Brothers and lovers she and I were
Now she seems to be sand under his shoes
There's nothing I can do
Can't stop what's coming
Can't stop what's on its way
Can't stop what's coming
Can't stop what's on its way
And now I speak to you are you in there
You have her face and her eyes
But you are not her
And we go at each other like blank ettes
Who can't find their thread and their bare
Can't stop loving you
Can't stop loving
Can't stop what is on its way
And I see it coming
And it's on its way
Add your thoughts
Log in now to tell us what you think this song means.
Don’t have an account? Create an account with SongMeanings to post comments, submit lyrics, and more. It’s super easy, we promise!
More Featured Meanings
Dreamwalker
Silent Planet
Silent Planet
No Surprises
Radiohead
Radiohead
Same ideas expressed in Fitter, Happier are expressed in this song. We're told to strive for some sort of ideal life, which includes getting a good job, being kind to everyone, finding a partner, getting married, having a couple kids, living in a quiet neighborhood in a nice big house, etc. But in Fitter, Happier the narrator(?) realizes that it's incredibly robotic to live this life. People are being used by those in power "like a pig in a cage on antibiotics"--being pacified with things like new phones and cool gadgets and houses while being sucked dry. On No Surprises, the narrator is realizing how this life is killing him slowly. In the video, his helmet is slowly filling up with water, drowning him. But he's so complacent with it. This is a good summary of the song. This boring, "perfect" life foisted upon us by some higher powers (not spiritual, but political, economic, etc. politicians and businessmen, perhaps) is not the way to live. But there is seemingly no way out but death. He'd rather die peacefully right now than live in this cage. While our lives are often shielded, we're in our own protective bubbles, or protective helmets like the one Thom wears, if we look a little harder we can see all the corruption, lies, manipulation, etc. that is going on in the world, often run by huge yet nearly invisible organizations, corporations, and 'leaders'. It's a very hopeless song because it reflects real life.
Magical
Ed Sheeran
Ed Sheeran
How would you describe the feeling of being in love? For Ed Sheeran, the word is “Magical.” in HIS three-minute album opener, he makes an attempt to capture the beauty and delicacy of true love with words. He describes the magic of it all over a bright Pop song produced by Aaron Dessner.
Blue
Ed Sheeran
Ed Sheeran
“Blue” is a song about a love that is persisting in the discomfort of the person experiencing the emotion. Ed Sheeran reflects on love lost, and although he wishes his former partner find happiness, he cannot but admit his feelings are still very much there. He expresses the realization that he might never find another on this stringed instrumental by Aaron Dessner.
Plastic Bag
Ed Sheeran
Ed Sheeran
“Plastic Bag” is a song about searching for an escape from personal problems and hoping to find it in the lively atmosphere of a Saturday night party. Ed Sheeran tells the story of his friend and the myriad of troubles he is going through. Unable to find any solutions, this friend seeks a last resort in a party and the vanity that comes with it.
“I overthink and have trouble sleepin’ / All purpose gone and don’t have a reason / And there’s no doctor to stop this bleedin’ / So I left home and jumped in the deep end,” Ed Sheeran sings in verse one. He continues by adding that this person is feeling the weight of having disappointed his father and doesn’t have any friends to rely on in this difficult moment. In the second verse, Ed sings about the role of grief in his friend’s plight and his dwindling faith in prayer. “Saturday night is givin’ me a reason to rely on the strobe lights / The lifeline of a promise in a shot glass, and I’ll take that / If you’re givin’ out love from a plastic bag,” Ed sings on the chorus, as his friend turns to new vices in hopes of feeling better.
I'm reading a little more into this song than most folks seem to be... to me, it's not just a friendship that's been destroyed, but a life that's about to be.
It seems to me that the singer has grown up with this friend all through childhood and adolescence, and now the friend has gotten involved with someone who is abusive, and it just keeps getting worse.
Abused folks are often dependent, and the phrase "I said you don't need my voice girl you have your own but you never thought it was enough of" strikes me as that... someone who can't speak for themselves and so other perople speak for them, controlling them.
"Sand under his shoes" is a pretty low thing to be, and naturally, when she confronts her friend about it, they fight, "go at each other like blank ettes."
The lively friend she had is gone, so far gone that she appears dead inside... "and now I speak to you are you in there you have her face and her eyes but you are not her"
And the singer is afraid that it's going to end in tragedy. That her friend is either going to suicide or be killed by the abuse. She's like to be able to turn away, I think, but she loves the friend too much.
It's a terrible position to be in: "can't stop loving, can't stop what is on its way, and I see it coming, and it's on its way."
@Doom Shepherd This is also my interpretation of the song. I saw her perform this in Glasgow on the 'Under The Pink' tour. She played it on a toy piano at the front of the stage. Very, very haunting.
@Doom Shepherd Wow, I do believe you nailed it! For a time, I was thinking perhaps they were refugees—in a camp together or something (blanket friends, after all), and I can still imagine that being the case, BUT I find your interpretation more powerful/salient. As someone who was IN an abusive relationship (and I do believe I would have died if I didn’t get out when I did), I can verify this idea of “you have her face…but you are not her,” as I often try to explain to ppl that I was so far gone—the constant brainwashing plus the survival impulse to not make the abuser mad, to name a couple causes—that I was not the “me” I am now; it feels very much like I have had multiple personalities b/c of this! At any rate, I had a best friend trying to reach me—as long ago as all this was, if I played this for her with this interpretation, I’m sure she’d agree and probably cry! Finally, I’ve seen friends begin down similar roads, and the feeling of helplessness is just beyond. Abuse reduces ppl to nothing, to “dirt under his shoes,” (there were cardboard cutouts of the women who had been killed by their partners in our city that year, eight with their names tacked to their chest. They were made for an awareness event, but walking past them every day—I think that might be what saved me. I didn’t want to become a cardboard cutout, a statistic, dirt under his shoes. It snapped me out of it), and abuse always gets worse once a certain line is crossed. If for some reason someone is reading this who is in an abusive relationship, look up “safe homes rape crisis,” this organization will aid you and save your life if you need it!<br /> Well, didn’t intend on writing all that, but seemed called for. As always, Tori digs to the depths of the soul, finds where the love and pain are, and turns them into something beautiful.