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All your women things
All your frilly things
Scattered 'round my room
Right where you left them
When you left them
Scattered 'round my room
All your hardness
All your softness
And your mercy
All your bridges and bras
Your cotton
and gauze
All your buckles and straps
Releases and traps
All your screws
and false nails
Oriental winks
and Egyptian veils
Oh all of these things
I gathered them
And I made a dolly
I made a dolly
A spread-eagle dolly
Out of your frilly things
Why couldn't I have loved you
This tenderly
When you were here
In the flesh
So tenderly
How could I ignore
Your left breast
Your right breast
How could I ignore
Your hardness
Your softness
And your mercy
Well it's been seven years
And the thought of your name
Still makes me
Weak in the knees
How could I ignore
Your left breast
Your right breast
All your frilly things
Scattered 'round my room
Right where you left them
When you left them
Scattered 'round my room
All your hardness
All your softness
And your mercy
All your bridges and bras
Your cotton
and gauze
All your buckles and straps
Releases and traps
All your screws
and false nails
Oriental winks
and Egyptian veils
Oh all of these things
I gathered them
And I made a dolly
I made a dolly
A spread-eagle dolly
Out of your frilly things
Why couldn't I have loved you
This tenderly
When you were here
In the flesh
So tenderly
How could I ignore
Your left breast
Your right breast
How could I ignore
Your hardness
Your softness
And your mercy
Well it's been seven years
And the thought of your name
Still makes me
Weak in the knees
How could I ignore
Your left breast
Your right breast
Lyrics submitted by ilse
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joanna newsom's song "does not suffice" often seems to be the response to smog's "all your women things". they both describe the clothes left around his room. as well, on her songmeanings page, zortmuckerman commented that the lyrics to Does Not Suffice "seem like an interesting counterpoint that has Joanna picking up all her clothes and leaving him to be with himself."
I have an image of Joanna's silky things casually strewn all over Bill Callahan's dark room which is really quite comedic. which is why I think it is symbolic more than it is literal. it makes sense that whoever this woman was, her memory would stay in his room.
but, if it in fact Joanna Newsom and the Does Not Suffice theory is true, it is nice that she wrote him a response in the form of an equally heartbreaking song.
from 1993-1995 bill dated mtv vj kennedy, so the song could be about her.
i don't care who the song's about. i like that it's been seven years, and just her name still affects him. maybe i just like my misery to last. people seem to get over things so fast ;) whenever i listen to this song, it makes me really sad -- just thinking of the way i didn't love, what i didn't notice, how i didn't appreciate enough... when i had the chance to. we never really do, i don't think.
This tenderly"
-This- tenderly, as in: as tenderly as he's loving the doll. The 'spread-eagle dolly.' Just making sure it's clear to everyone else that he gathered her woman-things and made a 'sex doll,' if you will, out of it all.
There was always something unnerving about this. Of course it's about lost love, missing someone, recollecting on the former state of a household with that person in it followed by change and acceptance, longing, and reflecting. There are, however, abnormalities in it considering Bill's personality.
The "women things" he's describing are incredibly ornate and incredibly "womanly". Bill comes off as a simple recluse, someone who wouldn't necessarily be involved with such a city girl as the woman he's describing. The haunting melody adds more of a sense of disconnect between the woman he misses and the memories of who she was. The particular line that I find jarring is
"Oh all of these things
I gathered them
And I made a dolly
I made a dolly
A spread-eagle dolly
Out of your frilly things"
I'm torn between an interpretation here. Of course he could be referring to a physical or nonphysical shrine of this woman, or the "dolly" (a lifeless, adorned, spread-eagle thing) could be referring to a baseless romance (maybe a prostitute) Bill (or the narrator) is seeking solace in during his time of grief. This lifeless woman is no more than a dolly; a shell of what he once loved in the woman.
"Why couldn't I have loved you
This tenderly
When you were here
In the flesh
So tenderly"
He's wishing his purely sexual encounters with this new woman were as devout and passionate as his encounters with the previous woman. Ultimately the "women things" scattered around the room seem to be of or relating to lingerie or some fancy women's wear. The "false nails" mentioned just don't coincide with a woman Bill would be intimately involved with on a personal level. The women things scattered around the room remind him a former lover and the baseless sex he or the narrator is engaging in is only to supplement that feeling of loss.
I'm sure most people who depart from a significant relationship can relate to this song/my interpretation. You try seeing other people but the artificial feeling of forced intimacy just reminds you of you past lover, year after long year.
This, as I stated, is a very unorthodox interpretation but I have always found something unnerving about the song. If this is too much of a longshot, I still believe that this song is both brooding and beautiful.