Pavlove

I think midnight cowboy is close, but I think he's missing a major chunk of the song that projects a lot of the play on pavlove's study.

Also, its not about a chick, I'm thinking the song is clearly about drugs -- "she's back to the bathroom for one more" aka doing drugs in the bathroom of a show/concert.

And "something make my chest stir, something make my head blur" -- drugs again (coke or uppers)

And the mirror part is super important:

"i'm the invisible man who can't stop staring in the mirror" - meaning he keeps looking for himself/trying to find himself, but can't see anything/cant see who he really is. I feel like THIS is the play on words for "Pavlov"

I don't know if there is a connection, but Pavlov was a russian physiologist who:

"studied the digestive system of dogs, investigating the nervous control of salivation and the role of enzymes. His experiments showed that if a bell is rung whenever food is presented to a dog, the dog will eventually salivate when it hears the bell, even if no food is presented. This demonstration of what is known as a conditioned response prompted later scientific studies of human and animal behavior."

I think the title "Pavlove" is a word-play on Pavlov's conditioned response study as it relates to human (male) behavior whenever a ridiculously hot girl is spotted.

"Something make my chest Stir Something make my head blur"

Basically saying, whenever I see a hot chick (presumably at a club, bar, church camp, NASCAR race etc.) I want to drink my face off to work up the courage to game that female.

I'm not sure if this is the "conditioned response" or if it has something to do with looking in the mirrors or if I am completely off base.

I'll stop now in case I'm butchering the meaning of all this.

In any event this song makes my foot tap.

Why haven't more people shown love for this song??? It's the best on the album!!! Fools...

err. has anyone heard of the Russian Psychologist Pavlov? Well, he's the one who pioneered conditioned responses in behavioral psychology. I just can't help but relate this song to that.

well, anyway. this is how I see things...

-the person in the song is a very lonely man. and he uses everything in his surroundings to make himself used to the loneliness. but he just ended up doing self destructive acts. (alcoholism, as stated on the second verse, "It's three drinks too late to talk to anyone but myself" and promiscuity, as stated on the pre-chorus, "she's back to the bedroom for one more")

-he apparently is addicted to his state ("...I'm just such a happy mess"), but he might be ill due to the vain attempts he had done to feel less pain from depression, and he may be dying.

-as for the invisible man part, he can't see the person he was before all the shit started hitting the fan. He may be seeing something different from what he thinks he is. he may have seen that his reflection looks and feels better than he does. and now tells his own reflection that he's going to make it feel as bad as he was.

I don't really see this song as something written for relationships. I see it as something written to describe how a person copes with the harsh reality he faces, and then ends up losing himself to the world.

To me this kind of screams drugs and how addiction ruins your life, and also how people are ignoring the problem "I'm the invisible man" and therefore ignoring people with this problem and drugs are the only way that those people can stop feeling so isolated.

I think the first line is "something make my chest stir" not "hurt".

I don't know if there is a connection, but Pavlov was a russian physiologist who:

"studied the digestive system of dogs, investigating the nervous control of salivation and the role of enzymes. His experiments showed that if a bell is rung whenever food is presented to a dog, the dog will eventually salivate when it hears the bell, even if no food is presented. This demonstration of what is known as a conditioned response prompted later scientific studies of human and animal behavior."

I think the title "Pavlove" is a word-play on Pavlov's conditioned response study as it relates to human (male) behavior whenever a ridiculously hot girl is spotted.

"Something make my chest Stir Something make my head blur"

Basically saying, whenever I see a hot chick (presumably at a club, bar, church camp, NASCAR race etc.) I want to drink my face off to work up the courage to game that female.

I'm not sure if this is the "conditioned response" or if it has something to do with looking in the mirrors or if I am completely off base.

I'll stop now in case I'm butchering the meaning of all this.

In any event this song makes my foot tap.

As for the "invisible man" part, I think it can have two meanings. Vanity, like even though no one sees him, he's still obssesed with himself, or surprise, meaning he looked in the mirror and saw he wasn't there, so now he can't look away, because he just doesn't understand why he's dissapeared. I'm not really sure about anything else, it does sound like it's about drugs though.

Wow, I have such a different view on this. Now I know its not right but here's my point anyway.

"I want to make you as lonely as me, so you can get, get addicted to this" I think of it as someone lonely, who is addicted to cutting. He feels like he is invisible and keeps trying to find himself

"I'm the invisible man who can't stop starin' at the mirror." He wants everyone to feel the way he is right now "I want to make you as lonely as me..." For me that sounds like he's going to kill himself betray someone to make them lonely.

"its a little to late to talk to anyone but myself" He's too depressed to talk to someone, because he's such a "happy mess"

"I'm not ready for a handshake with death, no" He didn't want to die but there was no other way to go.

Well this is my take on it, Maybe I was relating this song to me and thats where I pulled this from.

it's "drums are four on the floor" referring to the bass drum playing on all 4 beats of the song