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"
Old San Francisco, San Francisco B.C.
I lived with my true love and she lived with me.
"Romance is the douche of the bourgeoisie"
Was the very first thing she imparted to me
We had sarcastic hair, we used lewd pseudonyms
We got a lot of stares on the street back then.
Since her dad, a local barber, had been beaten to death
She had become a vocal martyr in the vegan press
The cops had failed, they couldn't catch a bus
They were looking for a male with a bad hair cut
Enter tumbleweed, exit love and our affaire d'amour
Was set on self-destruct.
She said "you don't make enough to provide for me."
I said "what about the stuff that we quote believe?"
She said "I left that on the sands of history
I've found a new man to take care of me
He dresses for success and emergency
And he moves a lot of concrete on the QVC."
Little, asian, deadly, like a cobra in the shade
Sat in the midst of the smoke that he made
His name was Mr. Games and he owned the place
It was a lonely bar and grill in the Lower Haight
He had a jeweler's hands and a blurry face
He knew I needed a chance so he gave me a break.
"If I hire you now, can you start today?
I got a high-rise job down by the bay.
Just a couple of rocks and some firearms
There's not many locks and just one alarm
My step-son Gene will pick you up and drive
Try to be his friend, he's got a friendly side."
Doll-house lightning and the next thing I knew
We were back at our point of rendezvous.
I was in the possession of burglary tools
Children's fur coats and diamonds and jewels
Gene's talking about insignificant shit
Just like crooks in the movies when they do that bit.
He said the power of metal will never be harnessed.
I thought the wages of metal should be heavily garnished.
We were waiting for his dad to meet us there
Gene took off his hat and I noticed his hair
It was neatly trimmed but a patch was bare
I knew it wasn't New Wave, it was human error.
Before I knew what I said, I said "killer cut."
I watched him silently putting out a cigarette butt.
Then he came at me with some fist cuisine
I had to duck aside and that was bad for Gene
Cause when he went by me he tripped and fell
Through the glass coffee table at the Wong hotel.
Right there and then Mr. Games walked in
With my ex-true love on his gamy limb.
So her dad's killer's dad was her new beau
And Games had a wife, whatta you know?
She got real real quiet till we chucked the kid
Then she went her way and I went his.
Old San Francisco, San Francisco B.C.
I lived with my true love and she lived with me.
"Romance is the douche of the bourgeoisie"
Was the very first thing she imparted to me
We had sarcastic hair, we used lewd pseudonyms
We got a lot of stares on the street back then.
Since her dad, a local barber, had been beaten to death
She had become a vocal martyr in the vegan press
The cops had failed, they couldn't catch a bus
They were looking for a male with a bad hair cut
Enter tumbleweed, exit love and our affaire d'amour
Was set on self-destruct.
She said "you don't make enough to provide for me."
I said "what about the stuff that we quote believe?"
She said "I left that on the sands of history
I've found a new man to take care of me
He dresses for success and emergency
And he moves a lot of concrete on the QVC."
Little, asian, deadly, like a cobra in the shade
Sat in the midst of the smoke that he made
His name was Mr. Games and he owned the place
It was a lonely bar and grill in the Lower Haight
He had a jeweler's hands and a blurry face
He knew I needed a chance so he gave me a break.
"If I hire you now, can you start today?
I got a high-rise job down by the bay.
Just a couple of rocks and some firearms
There's not many locks and just one alarm
My step-son Gene will pick you up and drive
Try to be his friend, he's got a friendly side."
Doll-house lightning and the next thing I knew
We were back at our point of rendezvous.
I was in the possession of burglary tools
Children's fur coats and diamonds and jewels
Gene's talking about insignificant shit
Just like crooks in the movies when they do that bit.
He said the power of metal will never be harnessed.
I thought the wages of metal should be heavily garnished.
We were waiting for his dad to meet us there
Gene took off his hat and I noticed his hair
It was neatly trimmed but a patch was bare
I knew it wasn't New Wave, it was human error.
Before I knew what I said, I said "killer cut."
I watched him silently putting out a cigarette butt.
Then he came at me with some fist cuisine
I had to duck aside and that was bad for Gene
Cause when he went by me he tripped and fell
Through the glass coffee table at the Wong hotel.
Right there and then Mr. Games walked in
With my ex-true love on his gamy limb.
So her dad's killer's dad was her new beau
And Games had a wife, whatta you know?
She got real real quiet till we chucked the kid
Then she went her way and I went his.
Old San Francisco, San Francisco B.C.
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"Gene's talking about insignificant shit Just like crooks in the movies when they do that bit. He said the power of metal will never be harnessed. I thought the wages of metal should be heavily garnished."
Anyone else think they're talking about Metal, the genre of music? I think it's a subtle dig at metal "musicians" getting big and famous. Berman is clearly not a metal fan.