Star

First of all, there is an incorrect lyric here which is supposed to be "All you dreamed you are," not "All the dreams you are."

Anyway, I interpret this song as a criticism of modern popular music in which the over-glamorous stardom that accompanies being a "rock star" often diminishes the importance of making creative and artistic music. I interpret the first lines of "If I could just ignore it / If I could just forget it / Like you do" as Justin saying that the art of music is being forgotten and he refuses to do so. "Gonna be a star / It won't be so hard" seems to me like he's saying that it doesn't take anything overly special to be a rock star nowadays, just as long as you get the right corporate connections. I also feel like the repetive and overly powerful snare drum pattern in the song and obnoxious twangy guitars are almost mocking "cliche" rock n' roll tactics.

Mistake edited!

I reckon the second "ignore it" (before the first "like you do") is "become it"

bootzy, i think you're right, but i think without considering the opening lines as ironic and un-ironic at the same time, you're leaving out the central tension of the song, and of much of the music broadrick has released as jesu, which is a certain yearning for what is out of reach. i think there is a part of anybody who is creative that wants to find a large audience, just as there is a part of everybody, no matter how nihilistic or self-abnegating, that yearns for connection. and that is the part that says "if i could just...." of course he can't, and we are free to fill in our own reasons why -- maybe he's too principled, maybe he's afraid of success, maybe he just doesn't have what it takes. but i think any reading of the song is incomplete without the acknowledgment that part of him wants it. the music makes this point brilliantly by being both aggressive and fritteringly poppy, amplifying that feeling of ambivalence, of at once desiring and rejecting, and it's this harmonious melding of the music and the sentiments of the lyrics, and broadricks' exploration of the psychology and emotional content of social marginality, that i find so powerful about his songs, particulary his jesu songs.

Well put there, scooper.

After almost an entire year after posting my first interpretation, I returned to find Scooper's wonderful addition to it. I think you're right on, Scooper, and to this day "Star" remains one of my favorite songs. Justin Broadrick is a musical god to me.