18 Meanings
Add Yours
Follow
Share
Q&A
Maggot Brain Lyrics
Mother Earth is pregnant for the third time. For ya'll have knocked her up. I have tasted the maggots in the mind of the universe. I was not offended, for I knew I had to rise above it all or drown in my own shit.
Go on, maggot brain.
Go on, maggot brain.
Go on, maggot brain.
Add your song meanings, interpretations, facts, memories & more to the community.
The mind of the universe, I think, is all that exists, or God if you will. All that exists has dark things, maggots if you will. Everyone is aware of dark things, the Vietnam War, Racism, other things. A peotic way of saying you experienced the dark things in existence is saying, "I have tasted the maggots in the mind of the universe." For those who follow the buddhist or hindu type stuff that many were into in the 60's, one of the things that is talked about is if you get wrapped up in the negativity then it will bring you down. So you need "rise above it all or drown in ..."
The mother earth is pregnant for the third time thing is why I came to write this. There is a theory that humanity has gone through three major cycles, we are now in the third. The first two cycles mother earth had stillborns, maybe this time she can give birth to an enlightend humanity.
while i am not sure the meaning of the statement at the beginning of this song. i do know that the guitar solo following it (the feature of the song) was influenced by George Clinton telling guitarist Eddie Hazel to "play as if your mother had just died."
@Terminal Sickie The solo in this song sounds as if Hendrix never died, and just changed his name to Eddie Hazel!
@Terminal Sickie The solo in this song sounds as if Hendrix never died, and just changed his name to Eddie Hazel!
Apparently george told eddie to play the first half like his mother died and the 2nd half like she came back to life...
The "maggot brain" is a state of mind that one can "rise above all the bullshit" and find release in the funk
Brilliant concept song, the album is a blast too
i saw this live, at the beginning of the song george gave a speech about living as one and it is the most amazing thing i have ever heard. if anybody has lyrics to the poem or speech. comment please.
Here's a question: if "Mother Earth is pregnant for the third time" refers to to the Vietnam War (which, don't get me wrong, I think is what is meant), why is she pregnant? Isn't pregnancy tied to giving life instead of taking it away?
i agree, but Mother Earth may be pregnant with the war and other bullshit we as a human race have undoubtedly "knocked her up" with
i agree, but Mother Earth may be pregnant with the war and other bullshit we as a human race have undoubtedly "knocked her up" with
@r3n3gad3 @crump76 I thought it might refer to the next generation, ie the first "pregnancy" was the dinosaurs who went extinct, the second was mankind with all its war and toxic ways, and the third was the young people who in the 60s and 70s had hope of changing all that. But you're probably right, though I would say it wasn't referring to just Viet Nam but also nukes and all the pollution and destruction of the environment.
@r3n3gad3 @crump76 I thought it might refer to the next generation, ie the first "pregnancy" was the dinosaurs who went extinct, the second was mankind with all its war and toxic ways, and the third was the young people who in the 60s and 70s had hope of changing all that. But you're probably right, though I would say it wasn't referring to just Viet Nam but also nukes and all the pollution and destruction of the environment.
i've heard the same story. it's music history. legend. the kicker is that supposedly eddie was tripping on acid at the time. which as you can imagine would have incredibly amplified the relevence of george clinton's statement. regardless, it's an incredible song and an even more incredible solo. the most tragic, moving, instrumental i've heard in my life. when i listen to this song i can't help but be lifted by it.
i get goosebumps everytime i hear it, its just...i dunno...one of my favourite songs EVER.
how come all the masters of music like Hazel and Hendrix overdose or kill themselves? does fame come at such a high price? or do the drugs come too cheap?
yeah, thats what I had gotten, too. some sort of weird ass funkadelic mythology involved. I've always like to think this, though: now, the first two sentences are almost an accusing sort of statement, sort of like "good job, assholes, what are you going to do about it?". Then, Mr. Clinton states, on a sort of tangent, that these maggots in the mind of the universe, the disgusting, writhing, seeming-to-be-negativitie ideas that infest the universe, are something that he is in the know about, something that he has even tried. And he "was not offended, for he knew he had to rise above it all, or else drown in his own shit". In fact, he's come to love the maggots, as is apparent by the repitition of the phrase "go maggot brain". Then, you put it to this minory sort of song with one of the most heartfelt, screamingly mournful solos of all time, with these soring highs and agressivly acidic lows, and you got your ass what george clinton was just rambling about, in musical form.
or maybe I'm just reading into all this shit a little too much.
mother earth being pregnant for the third time refers to the third major war on earth, The Vietnam War.