The song lyrics were written by the band Van Halen, as they were asked to write a song for the 1979 movie "Over the Edge" starring Matt Dillon. The movie (and the lyrics, although more obliquely) are about bored, rebellious youth with nothing better to do than get into trouble. If you see the movie, these lyrics will make more sense. It's a great movie if you grew up in the 70s/80s you'll definitely remember some of these characters from your own life. Fun fact, after writing the song, Van Halen decided not to let the movie use it.
I could be sleeping
I could be dreaming
I could have ordinary people chasing me from town to town
Mission Impossible
They've got a spy for every blink of your eye
I'm feeling awkward
I'm feeling tongue tied
They've got a knife for every time you take the same train into work
A family's like a loaded gun
You point it in the wrong direction
someone's gonna get killed
If you had such a dream
Would you get up and do the things you believe in?
Is he your husband?
Or just your boyfriend?
Is he the moron who's been beating you and keeping you inside?
I've never done this kind of thing
But if I kill him now, well who's gonna miss him?
I went up to the school
I took a walk up Castlehill
For every step there is a local boy who wants to be a hero
Do you want to do it now?
Outside the butchers with a knife and a bike chain
If you had such a dream
Would you get up and do the things you believe in?
If you had such a dream
Would you get up and do those things?
If you had such a dream
Would you get up and do those things?
While your head is clear
While your head is clear
While your head is clear
While your head is clear
I could be dreaming
I could have ordinary people chasing me from town to town
Mission Impossible
They've got a spy for every blink of your eye
I'm feeling awkward
I'm feeling tongue tied
They've got a knife for every time you take the same train into work
A family's like a loaded gun
You point it in the wrong direction
someone's gonna get killed
If you had such a dream
Would you get up and do the things you believe in?
Is he your husband?
Or just your boyfriend?
Is he the moron who's been beating you and keeping you inside?
I've never done this kind of thing
But if I kill him now, well who's gonna miss him?
I went up to the school
I took a walk up Castlehill
For every step there is a local boy who wants to be a hero
Do you want to do it now?
Outside the butchers with a knife and a bike chain
If you had such a dream
Would you get up and do the things you believe in?
If you had such a dream
Would you get up and do those things?
If you had such a dream
Would you get up and do those things?
While your head is clear
While your head is clear
While your head is clear
While your head is clear
Lyrics submitted by Empirer85, edited by fathousefly
I Could Be Dreaming Lyrics as written by Isobel Campbell Christopher Geddes
Lyrics © Sony/ATV Music Publishing LLC, Hipgnosis Songs Group
Lyrics powered by LyricFind
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I believe this song is about courage - having the ability to do in real life what you fantasize about doing in your head. People often imagine themselves doing heroic things, or making bold statements to others, but often this does not happen due to fear, anxiety about the situation and the response it would have. It's about standing up for what you believe in. The lyrics are wrong on here - it should be: "If you had such a dream, would you get up and do the things you believe in?"
Also, instead of hunted and haunted it's "I'm feeling awkward, I'm feeling tongue tied" - things that prevent us from speaking our mind and expressing how we really feel.
The first verse itself seeks to reflect the paranoia of modern society - everyones a stranger, and the often tulmutuous circumstances surrounding the modern family.
As always, just my opinion.
This is how I've interpreted the song, less literal and more about being courageous in life.<br /> "who was not to be daunted by the most gigantic word in the dictionary"<br /> <br /> For what it's worth when, I listen to the song I just long to be undaunted by the most insurmountable odds and go forth fearlessly, and I think there's something be said about what a song makes you feel.
It's not "I'm feeling hunted / I'm feeling haunted"
I'm pretty sure it's "I'm feeling awkward / I'm feeling tongue-tied"
It took me a bit of googling, but it's an extract from 'Rip Van Winkle' by Washington Irving. The full extract is:
Times grew worse and worse with Rip Van Winkle as years of matrimony rolled on; a tart tempter never mellows with age, and a sharp tongue is the only edge tool that grows keener by constant use. For a long while he used to console himself, when driven from home, by frequenting a kind of perpetual club of the sages, philosophers, and other idle personages of the village, that held its sessions on a bench before a small inn, designated by a rubicund portrait of his majesty George the Third. Here they used to sit in the shade, of a long lazy summer's day, talk listlessly over village gossip, or tell endless sleepy stories about nothing. But it would have been worth any statesman's money to have heard the profound discussions that sometimes took place, when by chance an old newspaper fell into their hands, from some passing traveller. How solemnly they would listen to the contents, as drawled out by Derrick Van Bummel, the schoolmaster, a dapper learned little man, who was not to be daunted by the most gigantic word in the dictionary.
I want to find a copy of this book. Sounds interesting!
you know the video of this where he's singin to the fox puppet. and when he says "do you want to do it now?" he makes the fox puppet shake its head.
well it's adorable
oh my god such a good song. okay. makes me think: crazy guy, paranoid schizophrenic maybe, decides to kill his sister's abusive husband. i got that it's his sister from the 'family's like a loaded gun' line. everything else is pretty clear.
just an idea. goooooooood song.
I LOVE this song, especially at the end when that girl is talking; freakin amazing.
can anyone tell what she's saying, i can only make out a couple of words and can't find the lyrics anywhere
you're unlikely to find Rip Van Winkle as a book on its own - it's a short story, so you'll probably either need to find the text online, or look for it in an anthology of some sort. It's an interesting choice of excerpt - definitely fits with the song, I just think it's sort of neat to see what parts they decided NOT to include (it's the better part of a paragraph, but leaves out a few lines).
the last paragraph: castlehill is a long road in ayr (which just happens to have butcher) and that's where all the school kids hang out from a secondary up there. I go to the school just down the road and there's quite a lot of rivalry and the local neds like to get together and have knife fights etc. i believe that's the school stuart went to. The kids round here can be pretty violent. I have a feeling we are (and/or were at some point in the last 15 years) the knife capital of the country. incase you were wondering. x
I got something like tooth_brush, but more like the guy is a pretty smart kid, and he's considering whether he should kill his sister's boy even though his "head is good" and "clear," he's got things to offer, and is fighting with whether it's best to stay out of it and protect himself but his sister's being beat, or to kill the guy and risk being killed in return, or put in jail, but then his sister is protected.
Maybe he's paranoid because he feels like people know what he's thinking of?