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36 Inches High Lyrics
Once I was a soldier
I rode on a big white horse
Silver pistols at my side
Carryin' the flags of war
And I Iost track of the men who fell
In the cannon's roar
I never got over bein' a soldier
Once I was a tax man
Collectin' dollars and dimes
I heard the rich man grumble
I heard the poor man cry
Some few couldn't afford to pay
Were put to a shackle and key
I never got over bein' a tax man
Once I was a ruler
About twelve inches long
Three times me made a yardstick
36 inches high
36 inches high was l
36 inches high
I never got over 36 inches high
I rode on a big white horse
Silver pistols at my side
Carryin' the flags of war
And I Iost track of the men who fell
In the cannon's roar
I never got over bein' a soldier
Collectin' dollars and dimes
I heard the rich man grumble
I heard the poor man cry
Some few couldn't afford to pay
Were put to a shackle and key
I never got over bein' a tax man
About twelve inches long
Three times me made a yardstick
36 inches high
36 inches high was l
36 inches high
I never got over 36 inches high
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Well, first, these lyrics exhibit Nick Lowe's love of wordplay for its own sake. (This is the guy who named his first EP "Bowi" after David Bowie had released one titled "Low".) So you see that Nick is playing with different meanings for the word "ruler" and for the phrase "never got over". In the last stanza, he says he was a ruler, which would mean a king or president, in the context of what came before in the song, but then switches to using the word to mean a measuring device that is 12 inches long.
Overall, though, I think the song is about playing roles given to us by society, especially roles that give us power over others. And he ends by humorously suggesting that these sorts of roles don't really amount to much.
@hbowie It's not Nick's wordplay in fact, it's a cover of a song by Jim Ford - quite a bold version Nick carries off anyhow
@hbowie It's not Nick's wordplay in fact, it's a cover of a song by Jim Ford - quite a bold version Nick carries off anyhow
Someone PLEASE help me understand these lyrics... what does it even mean.
As good as lyrics get IMO. Actually not wrtten by Lowe... Thought about it a lot. Here's the distilled rundown of my interpretation. He's saying this:
... somewhere back there, maybe in my blood, my imagination, or maybe reincarnation, I was a soldier. A pretty gnarly one too, like an American or British cavalry officer, or something. I was "in the shit" and it's really stuck with me eternally... then at some other point back there I was a tax collector. Again, I was good at it and oversaw some pretty bad stuff that seems pointless and has also really stayed a part of me.
Then, in 27 words he says this... then I got to be ruler once, and I also died countless times as an innocent child. But also lighten up, this has all just been a joke.