My love, I am the speed of sound
I left them motherless, fatherless
Their souls they hang inside-out from their mouths
But it's never enough
I want you
Carved your name across three counties
Ground it in with bloody hides
Their broken necks will line the ditch
'Til you stop it, stop it
Stop this madness
I want you
I have waited with a glacier's patience
Smashed every transformer with every trailer
'Til nothing was standing
65 miles wide
Still you are nowhere
Still you are nowhere
Nowhere in sight
Come out to meet me
Run out to meet me
Come in to the light
Climb the boxcars to the engine through the smoke into the sky
Your rails have always outrun mine
So I pick them up and crash them down
In a moment close to now
'Cause I miss, I miss, I miss, I miss, I miss
I miss how you'd sigh yourself to sleep
When I'd rake the springtime across your sheets
My love, I am the speed of sound
I left them motherless, fatherless
Their souls they hang inside-out from their mouths
But it's never enough
My love
I'm an owl on the sill in the evening
But morning finds you
Still warm and breathing
This tornado loves you, this tornado loves you
This tornado loves you, this tornado loves you
This tornado loves you
What will make you believe me?
This tornado loves you, this tornado loves you
This tornado loves you, this tornado loves you
This tornado loves you
What will make you believe me?
I left them motherless, fatherless
Their souls they hang inside-out from their mouths
But it's never enough
I want you
Carved your name across three counties
Ground it in with bloody hides
Their broken necks will line the ditch
'Til you stop it, stop it
Stop this madness
I want you
I have waited with a glacier's patience
Smashed every transformer with every trailer
'Til nothing was standing
65 miles wide
Still you are nowhere
Still you are nowhere
Nowhere in sight
Come out to meet me
Run out to meet me
Come in to the light
Climb the boxcars to the engine through the smoke into the sky
Your rails have always outrun mine
So I pick them up and crash them down
In a moment close to now
'Cause I miss, I miss, I miss, I miss, I miss
I miss how you'd sigh yourself to sleep
When I'd rake the springtime across your sheets
My love, I am the speed of sound
I left them motherless, fatherless
Their souls they hang inside-out from their mouths
But it's never enough
My love
I'm an owl on the sill in the evening
But morning finds you
Still warm and breathing
This tornado loves you, this tornado loves you
This tornado loves you, this tornado loves you
This tornado loves you
What will make you believe me?
This tornado loves you, this tornado loves you
This tornado loves you, this tornado loves you
This tornado loves you
What will make you believe me?
Lyrics submitted by laughing_man
This Tornado Loves You Lyrics as written by Paul Rigby Neko Case
Lyrics © Peermusic Publishing, Kobalt Music Publishing Ltd.
Lyrics powered by LyricFind
Add your thoughts
Log in now to tell us what you think this song means.
Don’t have an account? Create an account with SongMeanings to post comments, submit lyrics, and more. It’s super easy, we promise!
hudsucker's point is well-taken; Neko IS smart and this song is an extension of her "I don't write love songs" attitude... but Neko's resistance, strangely, reinforces the metaphor... in love and, especially, in love songs, we like to think in metaphors.. so a straightforward interpretation of this song would a man who is running away from a destructive relationship, hiding from a crazy, obsessed woman
but taken literally, we get a picture of love that is absurdly comic: a funnel of wind searching for its love, who is in hiding.. then we think 'how is this possible? a tornado loves?' -- for we know what happens when we love it and "come into the light" to meet it: we are gone, vaporized or smashed up like the transformers and trailers... thus, love becomes a hunt, a tragically sad and empty one ("carved your name across three counties," the path of destruction "sixty-five miles wide")..
the agony of unrequited love fuels the tornado's chase, but this obsession ultimately reveals a relationship in flight ("your rails have always outrun mine"), an escape from love's entrapment and disintegration... by the end of the song, "he" is safe from harm, "still warm and breathing"; our pained heroine/tornado is left alone and crying "What will make you believe me?"
as soon as we begin to laugh at this, we realize we've been thinking in metaphors all along... (have we been conditioned into thinking in metaphors? -- the "nurture"?) to love a tornado, we have to be prepared to die with it -- right? .. but, love as death, as a tornado, is the very thing we resist, and run away from...
thus, love becomes "literal" in this song.. it IS Nature -- formidable, destructive, unrelenting as IS the cyclone's eye...
It's "left THEM motherless."
And
"How you'd sigh yourself to sleep
when I'd rake the springsteen
across your sheets."
It is, in fact, a literal tornado - a love song from a tornado's point of view. On the one hand, it's a serial killer - raking a trail of destruction and death in its quest to find this woman, killing and destroying to impress her, or at least convince her he's really in love with her. On the other hand, he's just acting like a tornado is SUPPOSED to act. You can empathize with the tornado's pain and confusion with the way Neko sings that first "what will make you believe me" at the same time as it's scaring the hell out of you. Neko's voice and phrasing makes most of her songs work, but I can't always pin down what's going on in them, narrative-wise. This is an exception, and I can't imagine anyone will write a better song than this one this year.
No imagery or metaphor, she's talking about a real tornado.
All of the songs just end. Every time.
The reverb type on lead vocals does not match the rest of the parts.
There are other small peculiarities through the album.
OK, what is with the 20+ minutes of crickets/nature sounds?
It just goes on and on.
And if you listen to it carefully,
it's just the same sound clip over and over.
yes, her songs follow atypical song structures, but that's one of the things that makes her music so good imo.
I also think that the song is a comment on how men naturally pursue a love interest - clumsily, but with tenacity. I love the line "carved your name across 3 counties". How much more does the tornado need to do to show he's serious? I also like to think that the line "stop this madness" is tornado putting the blame on her for the destruction.
But as usual, the woman is always a few steps ahead in the love game as is said in the line "your rails have always outrun mine". Another beautiful part of the song is when the tornado tries to lure her by saying "come out to meet me/run out to meet me/come into the light" and tried to reassure her that nothing will happen when he says "But morning finds you still warm and breathing". The tornado tries every trick in the book to convince her to be his lover.
It truly is one of her best songs IMO. I'd like to think that although she openly rejects the need for a romantic partner that she still likes the thought of being desired by a man.
What a beautiful song! There is so much build up to the chorus at the end.
It finally happens and then the song ends.
It leaves me wanting so much more.
I noticed Neko Case has such an amazing way of keeping the listeners attention.
*Side note*
The new album is so good.
Listen to it on NPR. It's on their website until the release date, March 3rd.
I miss, I miss
the way you sigh yourself to sleep
when I breathe the springtime
across your cheek