So this has been.my favorite song of OTEP's since it came out in 2004, and I always thought it was a song about a child's narrative of suffering in an abusive Christian home. But now that I am revisiting the lyrics, I am seeing something totally new.
This song could be gospel of John but from the perspective of Jesus.
Jesus was NOT having a good time up to and during the crucifixion. Everyone in the known world at the time looked to him with fear, admiration or disgust and he was constantly being asked questions. He spoke in "verses, prophesies and curses". He had made an enemy of the state, and believed the world was increasingly wicked and fallen from grace, or that he was in the "mouth of madness".
The spine of atlas is the structure that allows the titan to hold the world up. Jesus challenged the state and in doing so became a celebrated resistance figure. It also made him public enemy #1.
All of this happened simply because he was doing his thing, not because of any agenda he had or strategy.
And then he gets scourged (storm of thorns)
There are some plot holes here but I think it's an interesting interpretation.
Beautiful to live in poverty
Just to spite what they're selling
Take a thousand hits to prove the rest and I'll move in
Millimeters still won't mean shit against well-done subversion
Fathers of invention will one day turn in their graves
When their own sons and daughters
Manifest destiny into a lesson to others
Sent away my crippled, let the old ones catagorize their deathcamps, they're all dead
It'll burn burn burn
Like they did to the Anarchists at their stakes
And burn burn burn
Like the histories they stole from us
One day patriotic thugs will dance to songs of justice
And cringe, and rack guns of shame (*3)
Well it may take a team of well-rounded hoodlums
In full riot gear to unrest objection
A well-controlled media to pick out our terrorists
When beaurocrats start dying from cancer
There are already businessmen who'll market bottled water
And purified aerosol solution, guess who's their target
Seven approaching a measure off the map
And you'll see me dance in the street once again
It'll burn burn burn
Like they did to the Anarchists at their stakes
And burn burn burn
Like the histories they stole from us
One day patriotic thugs will dance to songs of justice
And cringe, and rack guns of shame (*3)
And it'll burn burn burn, like they did to the Anarchists
And it'll burn burn burn, like the histories they stole from us
One day patriotic thugs will dance to songs of justice
And give apologies for immeasurably acted perfection
Burn burn burn
Like they did to the Anarchists at their stakes
And burn burn burn
Like the histories they stole from us
One day patriotic thugs will dance to songs of justice
And cringe, and rack guns of shame (*2)
Just to spite what they're selling
Take a thousand hits to prove the rest and I'll move in
Millimeters still won't mean shit against well-done subversion
Fathers of invention will one day turn in their graves
When their own sons and daughters
Manifest destiny into a lesson to others
Sent away my crippled, let the old ones catagorize their deathcamps, they're all dead
It'll burn burn burn
Like they did to the Anarchists at their stakes
And burn burn burn
Like the histories they stole from us
One day patriotic thugs will dance to songs of justice
And cringe, and rack guns of shame (*3)
Well it may take a team of well-rounded hoodlums
In full riot gear to unrest objection
A well-controlled media to pick out our terrorists
When beaurocrats start dying from cancer
There are already businessmen who'll market bottled water
And purified aerosol solution, guess who's their target
Seven approaching a measure off the map
And you'll see me dance in the street once again
It'll burn burn burn
Like they did to the Anarchists at their stakes
And burn burn burn
Like the histories they stole from us
One day patriotic thugs will dance to songs of justice
And cringe, and rack guns of shame (*3)
And it'll burn burn burn, like they did to the Anarchists
And it'll burn burn burn, like the histories they stole from us
One day patriotic thugs will dance to songs of justice
And give apologies for immeasurably acted perfection
Burn burn burn
Like they did to the Anarchists at their stakes
And burn burn burn
Like the histories they stole from us
One day patriotic thugs will dance to songs of justice
And cringe, and rack guns of shame (*2)
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