American Mary

Silver Eyes - attractive, memmorable but also cold

To me it's another National song about separation, breaking up - love gone dry and feelings for her with too many layers of good and bad. it turns love from an innocent exciting fling into a charged relationship - so the chorus is about indifference. Still unsure about the meaning of the title.

I agree with Shimi. I think this song is about a relationship that has ended and the protagonist is addressing his former lover. To me it seems that the lover did certain things in the relationship that over time cause the protagonist to lose his feelings for her. I think the line "i didn't try to take your love away i just never knew i had it..." Suggests that at one point he was very fond of her but felt that she did not care for him based on how he was treated. Now sometime later, he has collected himself and decided that this relationship is not right and loses his love for this person. It is at this point where the woman realizes that she has lost him and she wants him back. But it is too late and there is nothing she can do to change it because he has made his decision. Throughout the song there is an emphasis on the breakup not being out of spite of revenge but that it is the right thing to do and that if he was able to fall back in love, he would. But he can't.

i think this is the best song they've ever written. i can't believe there are no more comments than this! the lyrics and music are both fantastic... "don't look at me like someone you don't recognize... i didn't try to do this."

I love the line "If you kiss me, kiss me with your silver eyes." If only I knew what that meant..... Shouldn't more people know this song, since it is the URL of their website???

I always thought this was literally about America. The lines, "There is nothing you can say to ever make me want you," and "There is nothing you can say to ever make me leave you," are very similar to what I feel for America. Also the line, "Don't look at me like someone you don't recognize," is that feeling of frustration when you believe America's let you down or treating you like you're not a citizen. And one more: "Anything, anything you can do, do to me for everything I did for you - nothing." I complain about living in the U.S.A. but I never do anything to help or make it better.

A few years back, I heard this song for the first time on the long drive home from a friend’s house... one I happened to be head over heels for. The feeling wasn’t mutual. It was a beautiful night in late summer and there were nothing but farms and back roads in sight. I felt happy and empty/disappointed at the same time.The mood was similar to driving back home to your boring town after a long vacation at the beach. This song fit the mood perfectly. I’ve always felt like this was about him singing to a girl who was crazy about him but he never felt the same. I can’t seperate myself from that bias.

I love this song, but it's so cryptic. I can't say I can discern what any of it means. I mean, there are pieces that make sense, but they seem to make sense by themselves and not fit into a general flowing theme.

Also, I don't get the impression most fans own the stuff all the way back to the self-titled album like "us" :)

i dunno, but i love it.

Good stuff

I'm pretty sure it's "to ever make me 'need' you" not "leave."