Burn Your Life Down

As for the car comments, Tegan told Ragged Magazine that Sara had been really affected by something her grandfather said after her grandfather died... They used to go for drives together, but after she died, he looked to his right and she wasn;t there, and he just wanted to cry and go home. That's what those last couple of lines are about. For the rest, I'm not entirely certain. When they were writing the album, both sisters were sort of starting down a new path about things..both went through significant breakups and Tegan moved to a different city. I think this song is a salute to the awkward but necessary life transition...how it hurts, and we all lay in bed and feel melancholy, but we all have to start over sometimes.

Sara (of Tegan and Sara) has said that she wrote this song about her Grandfather. His partner, their grandmother, had just died. He had told Sara that it was really tough for him to be in the car now because when his wife was living they used to go on road trips and he's so lonely now without her. The song makes a lot of sense if you think about it in that context.

I love how she prononces 'light' i dnt really know what its about but i just love it!

I think this song is about a car wreck.. hence "I travel around the block and I’m not looking to my right I feel the glass against my cheek and I can’t see you in the light" and i think she cant get over the fact she got into a car accident with her loved one in the passenger seat. and shes having a hard time dealing with remembering it. she wants to remember it, but then again, she doesnt.

[personal experience reflects from it haha.]

UGH. My FAVORITE song off the new album! I absolutely love it.

I think it is about someone who over analyzes life.

And I agree with "slyoqi" think the last part is about a car crash.

She obviously go hurt somehow and she is basically saying that you shouldn't go around over analyzing life because life is too short and you never know what can happen in a blink of an eye.

This song says so much to me. It represents my life in a way. I'm kind of like the person who is over analyzing their life.

^ I agree. I was immediately interested in the title of the song. I agree it's about someone who overanalyzes their life. I think a lot of T&S's songs (and maybe this album) bring up the point of messing something up (maybe a relationship or your life) by overanaylzing it.

I feel like this could definitely be about a car wreck, but I don't think that the loved one was in the passenger seat, nor was this person lost. To me it sounds like the narrator of the song was in the passenger seat. "I travel around the block and I'm not looking to my right" (if she were in the passenger seat and not looking to her right she wouldn't see a car coming from that side) "I feel the glass against my cheek and I can't see you in the light" (when the car hit the headlights would have been blindingly bright, thus making her not see the driver as she was looking at her)

I think the beginning of this song (i.e. before the lines "I travel around the block," etc.) are meant to show how the two people involved are dealing with it differently as shown in the part, "but it’s a different situation a different situation you lay awake in the night just staring at the ceiling above pulling pieces of it out is such a waste of time" If the subject of the song was the driver, she would most likely be dealing with the situation in a much heavier way, blaming herself, etc.

And then in the following verse it feels to me like there is some sort of resolution: "You wake up in the night and refuse to be afraid of it now. Unfolding pieces of it faster don’t you waste your time." It seems like the subject, or driver, wakes up in the night with some sort of revelation and finally talks about it (unfolding pieces of it... like telling a story).

p.s. If it turns out this song isn't about a crash, then I'm going to feel like a complete crazy person, haha.

and i can't see you in the loight!! hehehe that's so cute the way she pronounces light hehehe!

It seems that this song is about someone going through a complete change in her life; she's starting over, from the ground up. As a result, however, her relationship with the speaker will suffer.

[It also seems that the situation is out of the subject's control (i.e. "pulling pieces of it out is such a waste of time"), although details about the reason for the change aren't given. The speaker is still making some level of decision, since she "[burns her] life down." It makes sense then that she is making the decision to change, but she was forced into it somehow. The actual change itself would most likely be moving a large distance away, a TnS motif. Not much info. is given here, either. The song, instead, focuses more on the consequences of the change, on both the speaker and the subject]

The speaker wants "you" to find "another way to get it done...for [her]." The subject is scared of her future, as well, laying awake at night analyzing whether everything will be alright. She comforts herself, though, remembering that "nothing is lost in the end;" she'll still have the memories, even if she burns her life down.

The beginning of the second verse sounds like the subject is getting the speaker to move on. This may mean a physical move (i.e. out of her house) or emotional, I can't really say. This subject, however, has solidified her decision. She realizes this is not truly her decision, but what she must do.

In the end, you find the speaker completely removed from the subject. She's probably driving away from the subject's home (continuing the idea of physical removal), and has an accident in her distraught state.
The accident may actually be on purpose, considering the last line "I break my heart around this...pole." The fact that she can't see the subject in the light probably was meant to have multiple meanings; it shows that the subject is no longer there for her in her times of need (the reason for her distress to begin with), and may also act as a metaphor as the speaker no longer seeing the subject in a beneficial way (light meaning good).

Yeah I don't think the end is about a car crash since I don't think Sara has her liscense. I think it's a metaphor for her not being careful and then someone she was close with got hurt because she wasn't watching out for them.