Disconnection Notice

This is such an awesome song, my favorite song on Murray Street. Beautiful...

when i saw them live it was tributed to Kurt...after that the lyrics started to make much better sense

the video in the new dvd, corporate ghost, also makes it make sense.

Kurtr Cobain? If so, he was a fan of Sonic Youth.

Yeah no kidding, they kinda toured together and Sonic Youth kinda got them a record deal with DGC....it goes much deeper than just him being a fan of Sonic Youth.

Anyway, yeah, it does seem to be about Kurt Cobain and his troubles with rock n roll stardom...more or less

sounds like 9/11 to me

It's interesting to learn that it's about Kurt. I never knew that. However, I think that anyone who has been feeling missunderstood and felt the horrible feeling of being manipulated can relate to this song. It's absolutely a gorgeous song. Can anyone desifer the lines: "This is no direction, prepare for the city, angels turn on heaven's light." I am really puzzled as to what their meaning is. thanks.

To me this song is about being told that you're no longer 'connected' to that which you are or do. specifically, since it explicitly mentions being a professional musician in the second verse, "hurry up, the stage awaits you don't forget to memorize your lines" i always figured it was something of a personal note from the band about how ill received NYC Ghosts and Flowers was, how maybe in one fell swoop years of acclaim suddenly "slipped away". I had never heard that bit about Kurt though, that's interesting.

According to their biography by David Browne, Thurston wrote it after he got a letter from Coco's school called a "disconnection notice", basically stating that she was alienated from the rest of the kids and whatnot. Thurston himself was extremely alienated in school because of his conservative looks and strange taste in music so he felt a connection with his daughter after receiving the letter.

So personally, I think that the lyrics are from the perspective of Coco towards her father. The first part of the third stanza kind of gives it away. Coco is often with them on tour, at least she was during her earlier days. From what I can remember I think she was 8 when Murray Street was released, so she probably would have been on tour, which explains the:

"Hurry up, the stage awaits you Don't forget to memorize your lines Can you hear them congratulate you?"

You know...helpful advice to her father before a show.

Also, "A secret Mona Lisa hides behind her smile" I think is too affectionate to be directed at anyone but his daughter

makes me think of being burnt out on drugs