Bleeding Powers

KICK ASS!!!

'And you still see people waiting for the next excuse for war' this song is off of the semi-political album 'Shake the Sheets', so it's not surprising that this line is in here. I believe it refers to our current situation.

Osama attacks twin towers, we attack Saddam. Saddam was our 'excuse for war' and Ted Leo is saying that he won't be our last one.

Sorry to all you conservatives out there. But I'm not really.

I honestly don't know how you could get something that specific out of one line in a pretty general song, but whatever. It just seems unlikely to me that he would take a fairly personal sounding song and randomly throw in some line about the war in Iraq out of no where, especially when the rest of it doesn't add up to that at all.

I see it more as a mood of searching. Looking for something comforting and hopeful, such as one's own home:

"The road leads somewhere, but it's not yet to your door."

That's why is disappoints him when the places he used to know aren't the same and the memories seem lost:

Let's go down to the old South End, where we used to meet Take me back to the basements and alleys on Walbridge Street Ah, but it'll only make me sadder when I can't conjure ghosts no more

And due to this he has this feeling of loneliness and loss, like there isn't a reason for these problems with people. He does not feel the comfort he seeks because everyone seems to be out to get each other:

"And you still see people waiting for the next excuse for war."

And if that is a statement about war itself, I see it more as one of distaste for war in general, the human nature of it, and how it relates to his searching for the answers, not some specific protest.

I think it's pretty clear that in most of Ted's songs the personal is political and vice-versa. The war line, while it may also have a personal meaning, is pretty obviously a reference to the Iraq war.

And you still see people waiting for the next excuse for war

Probably refering to the weapons of mass destruction

the line doesnt have to be so directly interpereted, the line could have been written because of the iraq war, but it probobly refers to the other wars before it, more than the iraq war itself, because it was the same way with the gulf war, , and vietnam, which was just us sticking our noses into something that wasnt our business. so the line most likely meant that america is always trying to start shit,and will not stop trying to star shit

I agree, it fits the Iraq war because of when it was written, but its just war in general. People are always looking for excuses for war. But I think that was part of the point, how it always is the same; that's what I got from the "still" seeing people waiting for the next excuse.

Great song, too.

This is quite a stretch, but it reminds me of the Beatles song "The Long and Winding Road," because of the chorus, obviously. It seems like the song is being sung to someone who is no longer alive, but when s/he was spoke out for peace. John Lennon?

. . . even though "The Long and Winding Road" is really more Paul's song, isn't it? Well, there goes that theory. But it still sounds like he's talking to someone who fought for peace in his/her life.

the first line is the most confusing..."all that time you were keeping me straight, i was bleeding powers"...i was thinking that the song is definitely about war, but what about the drug war? that's political, right up his alley. i was just thinking about being straight as being clean, and thats why he can't "conjure ghosts no more"

i hate analyzing lyrics sometimes, but thats why a lot of musicians don't tell the actual meaning, they are written so listeners can make their own.