These are my favorite lyrics of any song I have ever heard in my life except for one other song. But this song is simply about self-reflection and existential crisis.
My favorite line is people turn around with unseeing eyes, they are looking for something that doesn't exist.
I say this all the time, people are looking for something that doesn't exist like the perfect president or the perfect friend or the perfect country. Meanwhile the next possible steps within our reach we could be taking aren't be taken and the world we once knew is being eaten up by rust. No one studies history and learns from it so we repeat our mistakes all the while looking or trusting in god to save us.
The only line I am not crazy about is: Bodies good for nothing, but it's to nothing they belong. People say prayers and some work hard. If you give them all your money, they'll give you their hearts.
Maybe the guy is ascetic and doesn't believe in the importance of the body and it's needs I also don't know what he is referring to with giving people money and being given their hearts. Maybe buying friends? It certainly helps to have money, people will kiss your ass.
Anyways, brilliant lyrics that have only gotten more trues.
@eagleear first, hello from several years in the future lol.
@eagleear first, hello from several years in the future lol.
My take on this song is that it's about not taking chances in life to do what you love, in order to have that perfect, kind of middle of the road, comfortable life. That partly meshes with the "If you give them all your money They'll give you their hearts," but that also could be they'll be more likely to give up their dreams and possibly morals, if you'll give them more money.
My take on this song is that it's about not taking chances in life to do what you love, in order to have that perfect, kind of middle of the road, comfortable life. That partly meshes with the "If you give them all your money They'll give you their hearts," but that also could be they'll be more likely to give up their dreams and possibly morals, if you'll give them more money.
Huh...I never thought of it that way but looking at it again, I can see why you think that with these lines.
Huh...I never thought of it that way but looking at it again, I can see why you think that with these lines.
"Oh, what a perfect day To think about my silly world My feet are firmly screwed to the floor What is there to fear from such a regular world?
"Oh, what a perfect day To think about my silly world My feet are firmly screwed to the floor What is there to fear from such a regular world?
So yes, if you are super grounded then no risk no reward. And this line backs up the perspective:
So yes, if you are super grounded then no risk no reward. And this line backs up the perspective:
Passing by a cemetery I think of all the little hopes and dreams That lie lifeless and unfilled beneath the soil.
Passing by a cemetery I think of all the little hopes and dreams That lie lifeless and unfilled beneath the soil.
Well thanks for giving the song...
Well thanks for giving the song added dimension for me by sharing your comments.
A great way to wrap up a great album.
I agree Major Valor .... Perfect way
I agree Major Valor .... Perfect way
Sorry, but the original (vinyl) album as well as Matt Johnson's 2002 remastered CD version (both containing just 7 tracks) finish off with "Giant". Matt Johnson found the addition of "Perfect" to the US CD version useless and detestable. I agree with him that "Giant" is the much better closer, but don't agree that "Perfect" would be useless. As a kind of compromise, I usually listen to the 8-track CD version in a reversed order, with "Perfect" coming first and "Giant" coming last, so that I don't have to miss out on (the indeed great) "Perfect" but still finish off the album with...
Sorry, but the original (vinyl) album as well as Matt Johnson's 2002 remastered CD version (both containing just 7 tracks) finish off with "Giant". Matt Johnson found the addition of "Perfect" to the US CD version useless and detestable. I agree with him that "Giant" is the much better closer, but don't agree that "Perfect" would be useless. As a kind of compromise, I usually listen to the 8-track CD version in a reversed order, with "Perfect" coming first and "Giant" coming last, so that I don't have to miss out on (the indeed great) "Perfect" but still finish off the album with "Giant" (a really more suitable closer in my {and Johnson'} opinion).
Matt Johnson's early work as The The was extremely introspective, focused on themes of isolation, loneliness, the futility of life and the human condition, and a perceived apathetic nihilism of the Britain of his times. He was likely reading and channelling Jean-Paul Sartre at this time as many of these themes are the focus of Sartre's philosophy of Existentialism. In fact, several of the verse sentences of Perfect and the entire chorus are transferred almost verbatim from various passages of Sartre's first novel "Nausea" (La Nausee') published in 1938.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nausea_(novel)
[Edit: Added link to "Nausea" Jean-Paul Sartre Wikipedia entry.]