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"
And everything is going to the beat
And everything is going to the beat
And everything is going
And you said, it was like fire around the brim
Burning solid, burning thin the burning rim
Like stars burning holes right through the dark
Flicking fire like saltwater into my eyes
You were one inch from the edge of this bed
I dragged you back a sleepyhead, sleepyhead
They couldn't think of something to say the day you burst
With hungry lions, with all their might and all their thirst
They crowd your bedroom like some thoughts wearing thin
Against the walls, against your rules, against your skin
My beard grew down to the floor and out through the doors
Of your eyes, begonia skies like a sleepyhead, sleepyhead
And everything is going to the beat
And everything is going
And you said, it was like fire around the brim
Burning solid, burning thin the burning rim
Like stars burning holes right through the dark
Flicking fire like saltwater into my eyes
You were one inch from the edge of this bed
I dragged you back a sleepyhead, sleepyhead
They couldn't think of something to say the day you burst
With hungry lions, with all their might and all their thirst
They crowd your bedroom like some thoughts wearing thin
Against the walls, against your rules, against your skin
My beard grew down to the floor and out through the doors
Of your eyes, begonia skies like a sleepyhead, sleepyhead
Lyrics submitted by robbnthahood, edited by Littleredfox16, Civanfan
Sleepyhead Lyrics as written by Michael Angelakos Mary O'hara
Lyrics © Sony/ATV Music Publishing LLC, Warner Chappell Music, Inc.
Lyrics powered by LyricFind
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This song was originally written by a guy called Peter Gutteridge. He was one of the founders of the "Dunedin Sound" a musical scene in the south of New Zealand in the early 80s. From there it was covered by "The Clean" one of the early bands of that scene (he had originally been a member of in it's early days, writing a couple of their best early songs). The Dunedin sound, and the Clean became popular on american college radio in the mid to late 80s. I guess Yo La Tengo heard that version.
Great version of a great song,
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I looked up the lyrics to this song because it's amazing but I couldn't understand some of the words. I can see a few phrases that maybe allude to sex or a sexual relationship but the central story is a drug overdose. I think this is a story of a lover finding the other dead of a drug overdose and being in pure shock as medics, police, etc. swarm the scene.
Everything is going to the beat Everything is going
The opening line is repeated, which indicates pattern or routine. Lalala life goes on and all that. The last line is cut off mid phrase indicating a sudden break in that normalcy. I think this is when the speaker of the song discovers his lover dead from a drug overdose.
You said it was like fire...
They must have discussed her drug abuse before. He likely has been trying to help her get clean or maybe even thought she was.
..Like saltwater in my eyes
He's comparing the sensation she described from the burning in his eyes as he cries over her dead body. He could even be angry with her or himself for not preventing what he saw as the inevitable outcome of her drug addiction.
They couldn't think of something to say the day you burst...
This phrase is describing the aftermath. What can anyone say to a man that found the love of his life dead, especially when it might have been prevented. There are no words to comfort him. I think there could be religious reference (lions) in here but it also sounds like medics, police etc.
My beard grew down to the floor and out through the doors Of your eyes...
I think he is trying to say that this emotional trauma has aged him.
Overall I think he has been in shock the second that fourth line of the opening phrase cuts off. He found her and has been sitting in the corner, watching police and medics swarm around her body, no one can comfort him, he is lost in a trance, staring into her drugged out, dead eyes and in that moment he feels like he aged a lifetime from his grief.