Well, in my opinion this song is about being a young & maybe a little naive &/or introverted girl and finding yourself loving a man who is at first very charming, carefree & outgoing, and seems at first to be without limits, as in
"There was a time
you opened up every doorway
you didn't mind if everything
wasn't your way"
then that man starts to gradually become more introverted & shows their more possessive/obsessive side to you as the relationship progresses, even while they keep up the appearance of being carefree & outgoing to everyone else,
"Don't pull away
that goes against what you told me
I look in your eyes
I realize what you've sold me
is love in a vacuum"
so you confront them about the way they're acting and of course they deny it,
"I think you've changed
but you insist that
that's not true"
quite possibly they are an addict of some sort, my guess would be cocaine, &/or showing very obsessive behavior towards you (early on in the video for this song we see the man hanging a picture up, it is a very large portrait of Aimee & it is prominently displayed in his/their apartment for the duration of the song), thus their "love in a vacuum",
"You look so strange, so distant
that you're hardly you
Now I can see
how you have been acting different
You say it's me
but I know
that it isn't
it's love in a vacuum"
but still you are in love with them and don't want to leave them and you know that they are truly in love with you and they don't want you to leave them either, maybe they are convinced you can save them from themself, maybe they are so broken that the possibility of an overdose &/or suicide attempt is very real and you want to get through to them that their behavior not only dangerous but it is also just pissing you off and if they don't wise up they run the risk of loosing you, as in the lines
"You will be lonely
if you leave me alone", so you want to save them but can't get through to them due to the addiction &/or emotional problems they have,
"Love in a vacuum
and that's not enough
love in a vacuum
You will be lonely
you'll be the only one who feels this way
You will be lonely
if you leave me alone
You will be lonely
you'll be the only one who feels this way
it's just not enough"
you want them to understand that the love they are giving you is not enough when it is filtered through the vacuum of their drug addiction &/or emotional impairment,
"You will be lonely
you'll be the only one who feels this way
it's just not enough
and just wait
you will be lonely
Love in a vacuum
Love in a vacuum
and that's not enough
Love in a vacuum".
'Love In A Vacuum' for me is a hauntingly truthful acute argument on the loneliness of obsession and almost inevitable loss of love that follows people who are broken in some way or another; the obsessives, the coke heads, the drunks, addicts or the just-plain-old emotionally broken; a razor sharp, lyrically driven, deceptively poppy, yet ultimately-depressing-in-the-best-way song.
Quintessential Aimee Mann.
They're taking me down, my friend
And as they usher me off to my end
Will I bid you adieu?
Or will I be seeing you soon?
If what they say around here is true
Then we'll meet again
Me and you
My time is at hand, my dove
They're gonna pass me to that house above
Is Heaven just for victims, dear?
Where only those in pain go?
Well it takes two to tango
We will meet again, my love
I know
If you're in Heaven then you'll forgive me, dear
Because that's what they do up there
If you're in Hell, then what can I say
You probably deserved in anyway
I guess I'm gonna find out any day
For we'll meet again
And there'll be Hell to pay
Your face comes to me from the depths, dear
Your silent mouth mouths, "Yes, dear"
Dark red, and big with blood
They're gonna shut me down, my love
They're gonna launch me into the stars
Well, all things come to pass
Glory hallelujah
This prayer is for you, my love
Sent on the wings of a dove
An idiot prayer of empty words
Love, dear, is strictly for the birds
We each get what we deserve
My little snow white dove
Rest assured
And as they usher me off to my end
Will I bid you adieu?
Or will I be seeing you soon?
If what they say around here is true
Then we'll meet again
Me and you
My time is at hand, my dove
They're gonna pass me to that house above
Is Heaven just for victims, dear?
Where only those in pain go?
Well it takes two to tango
We will meet again, my love
I know
If you're in Heaven then you'll forgive me, dear
Because that's what they do up there
If you're in Hell, then what can I say
You probably deserved in anyway
I guess I'm gonna find out any day
For we'll meet again
And there'll be Hell to pay
Your face comes to me from the depths, dear
Your silent mouth mouths, "Yes, dear"
Dark red, and big with blood
They're gonna shut me down, my love
They're gonna launch me into the stars
Well, all things come to pass
Glory hallelujah
This prayer is for you, my love
Sent on the wings of a dove
An idiot prayer of empty words
Love, dear, is strictly for the birds
We each get what we deserve
My little snow white dove
Rest assured
Lyrics submitted by Dressed2Depress, edited by Tmesis
Idiot Prayer Lyrics as written by Nicholas Cave
Lyrics © BMG Rights Management
Lyrics powered by LyricFind
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Love in a Vacuum
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its amazing how far music can come.. 24 years after it released and its one of the most heartfelt songs ive heard
Corpse I Fell In Love With
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He reuses the verse melody from the previous album's "Dirty Little Religion", the topics of the verses are all over the place, and he packs too many words into one line (goes to show...) and too few in another (it's pretty hard to find), and rhymes "Henley Regatta" with "Persona non grata", but gets away with it all as only he could.
Fast Car
Tracy Chapman
Tracy Chapman
"Fast car" is kind of a continuation of Bruce Springsteen's "Born to Run." It has all the clawing your way to a better life, but in this case the protagonist never makes it with her love; in fact she is dragged back down by him.
There is still an amazing amount of hope and will in the lyrics; and the lyrics themselve rank and easy five. If only music was stronger it would be one of those great radio songs that you hear once a week 20 years after it was released. The imagery is almost tear-jerking ("City lights lay out before us", "Speeds so fast felt like I was drunk"), and the idea of starting from nothing and just driving and working and denigrating yourself for a chance at being just above poverty, then losing in the end is just painful and inspiring at the same time.
The Night We Met
Lord Huron
Lord Huron
This is a hauntingly beautiful song about introspection, specifically about looking back at a relationship that started bad and ended so poorly, that the narrator wants to go back to the very beginning and tell himself to not even travel down that road. I believe that the relationship started poorly because of the lines:
"Take me back to the night we met:When the night was full of terrors: And your eyes were filled with tears: When you had not touched me yet"
So, the first night was not a great start, but the narrator pursued the relationship and eventually both overcame the rough start to fall in love with each other:
"I had all and then most of you"
Like many relationships that turn sour, it was not a quick decline, but a gradual one where the narrator and their partner fall out of love and gradually grow apart
"Some and now none of you"
Losing someone who was once everything in your world, who you could confide in, tell your secrets to, share all the most intimate parts of your life, to being strangers with that person is probably one of the most painful experiences a person can go through. So Painful, the narrator wants to go back in time and tell himself to not even pursue the relationship.
This was the perfect song for "13 Reasons Why"
Hard one to figure: It reads like a letter: an epistle from (nearly) beyond the veil to someone who was once loved and has sinced caused pain.
(perhaps the recipient is partially to blame for this person's passing?)
In the ending: "We each get what we deserve...My little...dove" "Rest assured" I sense a sinister facetiousness made all the more dark by the use of old terms of endearment.
Their wish is not good for the recipient of this plea, and the reader chides himself by calling his supplications and "Idiot Prayer". He's angry, but he knows his furor and intentions are whispers to the howling winds of life.
Nonetheless, he wonders (as he surely must!) what they might feel meeting again beyond words, beyond flesh, beyond life.
Typical Nick Cave fair, and bless him for it. I only wish he could chime in here and give some thoughts on all of our crazy interps. I know he'd dig seeing the variety of interpretations.
This is a strange one. I never did work out how this nasty little song fits into The Boatman's Call. The speaker seems to have not only killed his partner but battered her - her mouth is "dark red & big with blood". The key verse, I think, is the third, where we find weasel words of self-justification: I don't think you could say anything worse to the person you murdered than "you probably deserved it anyway" (apart from "it takes two to tango"!). At the end, he seems to imply that both of them got their just desserts. None of which explains why this works as an affecting love song! The genius of Nick Cave, I suppose.
i always thought the 'dark red and big with blood' line was referencing the many vicious 'bites' lovers take at each other with words, not literal blood. at least that seems to be the way it works at my house.
There are some poetically cruel words on this one.
"Love, dear, is strictly for the birds" "If you're in hell, then what can I say, you probably deserved it anyway"
I didn't think about the possibility of these words being spoken by a man about to be executed. It makes sense to me now. I thought he might be on the verge of dying, remembering his deceased lover. I feel that the narrator might be a bit short on mental sanity, all the "dears", "doves" and, even worse, that last "my little snow white dove" seem to suggest a perverse tenderness, or maybe it's a way for him to try to calm the guilt he feels for killing her. Or maybe both. I'm not sure on a possible meaning, but I love this song anyway.
I think it fits well with The Boatman's Call. People suck. Relationships hurt. He killed her. Maybe she deserved it. Maybe she didn't but she'll forgive him. What will his fate be after he dies?
It's about a murderer about to be executed...these are his last thoughts towards his victim, a woman that he loved...he's hoping to meet her again in Heaven("if you're in Heaven then you'll forgive me, dear").
There's no murder here. it's about the dichotomy of salvation and love when your lover falls short of salvation. My reading was always that the singer is bitterly mocking his lover but recently I've become unsure.
This cool but cold song could be a companion song for "I do dear, I do". In that song the lover feels a morose sinking in his heart when he becomes aware of how he feels about his lost love. The lover is torn between yearning for a women he still hasn't given up, his well wishes for her, and sadness of the loss of the love, accompanied by some scorn.
I think this song more about scorn minus those other things. It is a candid portrayal of an ego vying to survive after being somewhat crushed and mangled. It is concerned with the vindication it's self and the condemnation of the sins those whome contributed to its sorry state. Dejected and imersed in gloom the ego condems love and the lover, and takes its revenge.
Guy on death row coming up to his execution and thinking about the victim. Bit of black humour about heaven and hell along the way.
A man threatening his partner through prayer as he awiaits execution for her murder. He's saying he'll be able to do it all over again very shortly when he is once again joined with her in the afterlife. A beautiful yet genuinely nasty song.