Raven

Great song, Dave's voice is absolutely critical in it, in fact i would say that it is another instrument itself, as it is in all his songs. Im sad to see how few people have commented or even viewed the songs off of the Lillywhite sessions, or the upcoming cd "Busted Stuff". great song

id just like to add that this song rules live in the new tour.. but the lyrics arent even close to what has been posted they have changed it all, def sounds awesome

as far as i've been able to find, the lyrics have gone through three solid "evolutionary stages" - pre Summer So Far, Summer So Far (Lillywhites), 2002 tour. the lyrics above are the pre SSF ones (sure, these probably changed every night for quite some time). the SSF lyrics can be found at http://www.dmbml.com/music/lyrics/lillywhite.html way down at the bottom. the 2002 lyrics are as follows: Watcha got, watcha got In your hand Father said to Son I’ve got the whole world here, daddy ‘tween my fingers and my thumb.

You take care of it please, For it’s the only one. But it’ll take me a lifetime, old man To undo what you’ve done.

Undo what you’ve done. Oh come on now, the boy Now what would Jesus do. Shake his head like the angry mother spoke The boy and say, I did what I could do.

You take care of these, For it’s the only one. And it’ll take you ten lifetimes, boy To undo what I’ve done.

Boy shrugged, walked away, The man stood and watched As he was leaving. The boy just walked away The man stood and hold thinking.

One hand is empty, The other hand holds the gun. Everything seems open, Everything is shut down, down, down Begin to (enter? end it?) Is it really just to go round, around, around And when it stop, yeah, its Nothing more than nothing more than My point of view.

Watcha got, watcha got In your head? Your secret’s safe with me. Well, I found the truth My friend Let me whisper in your ear.

Take good care of it please, It’s the only one there is Can I twist it, please, Can I give it just a little twist?

But boy shrugged, and walked away, The man stood, and watched As he was leaving. The boy just walked away, The man stood alone twisting.

One hand is empty, oh, The other holds the gun. Everything is open. Everything is shut down, down, down, No one is holding Even if, even if it’s (?), You never know at all, The ground beneath you’s nothing more Than one point of view.

But boy shrugged and walked away, The man stood and watched As he was leaving. The boy just walked away, The man stood alone twisting.

One hand is bleeding, The other hand holds the gun. Everything is open, oh, Everything is shut down, down, down No one is holding, Even if, even if you know, You never know at all, The ground beneath you’s nothing more Than one point of view.

But boy shrugged walked away, The man stood and watched As he was leaving. The man just stood there twisting.

as Brian Pace says in an article at nancies.org, these lyrics have sections that seem to deal with priest abuse (article at http://www.nancies.org/articles/020518.php )

as far as i've been able to find, the lyrics have gone through three solid "evolutionary stages" - pre Summer So Far, Summer So Far (Lillywhites), 2002 tour. the lyrics above are the pre SSF ones (sure, these probably changed every night for quite some time). the SSF lyrics can be found at http://www.dmbml.com/music/lyrics/lillywhite.html way down at the bottom. the 2002 lyrics are as follows: Watcha got, watcha got In your hand Father said to Son I’ve got the whole world here, daddy ‘tween my fingers and my thumb.

You take care of it please, For it’s the only one. But it’ll take me a lifetime, old man To undo what you’ve done.

Undo what you’ve done. Oh come on now, the boy Now what would Jesus do. Shake his head like the angry mother spoke The boy and say, I did what I could do.

You take care of these, For it’s the only one. And it’ll take you ten lifetimes, boy To undo what I’ve done.

Boy shrugged, walked away, The man stood and watched As he was leaving. The boy just walked away The man stood and hold thinking.

One hand is empty, The other hand holds the gun. Everything seems open, Everything is shut down, down, down Begin to (enter? end it?) Is it really just to go round, around, around And when it stop, yeah, its Nothing more than nothing more than My point of view.

Watcha got, watcha got In your head? Your secret’s safe with me. Well, I found the truth My friend Let me whisper in your ear.

Take good care of it please, It’s the only one there is Can I twist it, please, Can I give it just a little twist?

But boy shrugged, and walked away, The man stood, and watched As he was leaving. The boy just walked away, The man stood alone twisting.

One hand is empty, oh, The other holds the gun. Everything is open. Everything is shut down, down, down, No one is holding Even if, even if it’s (?), You never know at all, The ground beneath you’s nothing more Than one point of view.

But boy shrugged and walked away, The man stood and watched As he was leaving. The boy just walked away, The man stood alone twisting.

One hand is bleeding, The other hand holds the gun. Everything is open, oh, Everything is shut down, down, down No one is holding, Even if, even if you know, You never know at all, The ground beneath you’s nothing more Than one point of view.

But boy shrugged walked away, The man stood and watched As he was leaving. The man just stood there twisting.

as Brian Pace says in an article at nancies.org, these lyrics have sections that seem to deal with priest abuse (article at http://www.nancies.org/articles/020518.php )

i think its about an adult finding a young boy smoking pot as a "way out" i dont know, i could be wrong...but thats just how i see it

Well...I agree this song is one of my favorites on the new Busted Stuff albulm....except I do like the Lilywhite version better. Queston: it's called Raven, why?

i think this is one of daves best songs, maybe my favorite on busted stuff. i think dave is the raven, watching this from his point of view.

alright these lyrics posted and the ones on my cd are NOTHING a like

I was irritated when I read peoples' interpretations of this song on nancies.org, some of them thought that Dave was sending a message about perversion among priests, that the "Father" Dave refers to was literally a priest. I don't think that Dave had any such intention.

When I got Busted Stuff I noticed immeaditly all the lyric changes from Lillywhite sessions, but this song espically. I can't really figure it out. I see the Priest thing, but i still need to be sold on that point. I see that the Man is trying to sell a good point: "..You take care of it please, For it’s the only one." But is really bad. As in he was 'twisting' the 'truth'. i put in quotes becaus i still think it's all metaphoric.
Maybe the man is self-destructive, cuz one hand's bleeding and the other holds the gun. Or something hypocritical like that. Anythought on what he did? As in "..take me a lifetime to undo what you've done" Boy's probably trying to fix something bad that the man did. i think..maybe...perhaps...? Inside the cover it says: "Shake his head like and angry mother, SMOKE the boy..." Still tryin to figure that one out. OTHER PEOPLE: speak! i really want to hear other takes on this one!

"The ground beneath you’s nothing more Than one point of view. " Favorite quote, interesting point