Sugar Mice

Fish gave an interview and said it was written on a rainy Sunday afternoon when he was touring. He was missing his wife and daughter and rang home to speak to Tamara his wife and Tara his daughter. It was a stilted and difficult conversation and he felt terrible and alone and was really missing them. After he went for a drink in a bar and looked around him at all the other men sitting quietly drinking alone. He then penned the lyrics. The 'sugar mice' refers to the sweets that melt easily in the mouth or in water. It refers to us all being transient beings and our lives can end as quickly as the sweets melting in the rain. Our lives can end at any given moment and would anyone really care? The most obvious part is that the husband is no longer with his wife and children and is calling home to speak to them but they don't really have the time for him as he has bcome a sad and lonely alcoholic. If you watch the video on you tube it is very litteral and tells the story perfectly.Sadly it came true as he and Tamara sadly split and later divorced. Fish is an amazing lyricist and I adore his work and this song always makes me want to cry.

Obviously inspired by Fish's own struggles with family, but the voice in the story is an estranged ex-husband looking back on his life decisions.

He has spent a lot of time brooding on how his relationship fell apart ("Trying to piece together conversations / Trying to find out where to lay the blame") but has come to accept over time that it is fundamentally himself that is broken, useless, deserving of blame ("you can blame it on me"). The verse ends with the titular line ("We're just sugar mice in the rain"): A sugar mouse is a small UK candy which would quickly melt to nothing in water. The line is a nihilistic crutch for the character, nothing really ultimately matters, everything is ephemeral, you can blame it on me, whatever, it's not like it means anything.

Of course, the central tension of the song is that the ex-husband doesn't really believe that, it's just something to numb the pain.

It's implied he now lives above a bar ("I heard Sinatra calling me through the floorboards"), and describes it in melancholy tones that befit his general depression.

Ex-husband spends a lot of his time at the bar. He tries to convince himself that it would never have worked, he couldn't have been a good husband and father, it just wasn't for him, he prefers to be on his own, he is a broken person not suited to that life ("'Cause I know what I feel, know what I want I know what I am"). But his thoughts return always to the kids he has abandoned, the cowardly, childish way he left them, as if their upbringing was just an optional event he decided to skip ("Daddy took a raincheck").

Possibly inspired by an event in Fish's own life, the character recalls an uncomfortable call with his children. It brought home the unbearable feeling of guilt. He had assumed his ex-wife would have moved on by now, but finds out it's not the case ("When I heard them asking questions I knew that you were all alone"). He attempts to frame his leaving as an act of sacrifice, better in the long run, he was an unemployed loser not fit to be their father. But even this belies a selfish reason, he just wanted to flee the guilt of being seen as a deadbeat ("I just couldn't stand the looks on their faces saying, "What a jerk").

The song ends in the self-pitying laments of an alcoholic. He will live the rest of his life at the bar, an endless loop of the same thoughts rotating in his head. He meant well, he had good intentions at heart, life dealt him a bad hand ("...broken angel..."). But he knows he is fooling himself ("...clutching at straws..."). His thoughts recur in the same familiar pattern they always do: Blame it on me, Sugar mice in the rain, Daddy took a raincheck...

This is obviously about Fish dealing with ex wife and children. This is so an alcoholic dealing with the consequences. I can understand it easily and this is him telling somehow my story. Excellent

This is one of the saddest songs I know - gets me every time I hear it.

I was the guy at the end of the bar. Before the concert in Milwaukee,Fish was in line to order food and I was in front of him . I bought him a carona with a lime. He sat at the bar to eat his dinner and soon later I sat next to him thinking I will never get a chance to talk to a rock star so I sat next to him and made a few comments about a U 2 video playing as he ate. We talked on a human level for a few minutes and I’m sure our conversation brought him to think of family. ( not intentional) But I do know the drink he handed me during garden party was a Jack and coke!! That , my friends, was a song written for me!

This is a song Fish wrote while on a off day from touring in US (a Sunday I think). It seems to be about either his father or a father leaving or being forced to leave home or a husband who left home.

I heard this when Dream Theater played this as part of Surrounded '07 when I saw them earlier this year. It was simply beautiful, I just had to check Marillion out. It was a wise decision =)

^I saw that six days ago when they were in Clearwater. It was magnificent to hear...I thought it was "Through My Words" from SFAM (the main melody sounds like it) and I was enticed to go check this song out. Brilliant.

I think its clear to what the general meaning to this song is...but what exactly is a "sugar mice"? What does he mean by that term??

Sugar mice are a kind of candy. See this linka: http://store.addedtouch.us/1250.html?S=SC