Sentimental Guy

this song's pretty self-explanatory but il comment since no one has yet. this guy used to be a good person but then he does something to make him lose his morals n all that. reminds me of someone on drugs kinda....

It seems like he passed all these opportunities in the past with someone, and now he's reflecting on it.

I think this song is more about just forgetting your past. He used to know people that were really important to him, and yet he just goes on without them. He eventually ends up completely blocking them out of his past, which is kinda sad, since he used to be a sentimental guy.

I agree with couchmonkee that he's remembering people who were important to him, but they drifted apart naturally. Yet, now he wishes he'd said things or done things before everything had changed so much that it's too late and there's no point caring anymore.

This song is awesome. It was my favourite from Songs For Silverman (well, after I got over Landed :P) and the best fun is playing it on the piano. I agree with all comments here, because ben folds' music is about inspiring thought! Go Benny!

this song is so honest & simple. and i love every bit of it.

I love this song. It kind of reminds me of myself sometimes. Weird thing to say, I know.

People talkin' and I'm watching As flashes of their faces go black and white And fade to yellow in a box in an attic

The imagery is fantastic.

I consider this song in tandem with Ben's "Smoke." In that song he discusses his refusal to let his past affect him by describing a kind of metaphorical bonfire of all of the reminders of the past. Here I think there is certainly a hint of regret about that idea of looking at things. All of our pasts affect every one of us, and whether you are satisfied with your past or not, things about people you knew become a part of you, and "come out from time to time." I like the line immediately following that stipulates that "Probably nobody i know now would notice." As your life changes, and the people you surround yourself with do as well, there are aspects about you that other people just are never going to get. Like telling a joke that all of your old friends would get but that none of your new friends understand, there is a sense that we lose something when we distance ourselves from our pasts and the people that made us into who we are. By distancing yourself from your past, how can you not view the people in your life NOW as people who one day will equally forgotton...and fading... Based on some of his other work, I'd bet that this is a kind of true story for Ben, but for the rest of us it serves as more of a cautionary tale.

I like this song, especially "little things you said or did are part of me, come out from time to time, but probably no one now would notice." I was expelled from a private bording school once upon a time and now that I'm going to my school in my far-away hometown and I'll hear or say things that remind me of people I used to know from time to time, but I can't share them because no one else would know what I'm talking about.