1
Tonight's the night when the waters rise
You're groping in the dark
The ticket takers count the men who can afford the arc
The ticket takers will not board
For the ticket takers are tied
For five and change an hour
They will count the passers by
They say the sky's the limit
But the sky's about to fall
Down come all them record books cradle and all
They say before he bit it
That the boxer felt no pain
But somewhere there's a gamblin' man
With a ticket in the rain
Mary Anne, I know I'm a long shot
But Mary Anne, what else have you got
I am a ticket taker, many tickets have I torn
And I will be your arc, we will float above the storm
Many years have passed in this river town
I've sailed through many traps
I keep a stock of weapons should society collapse
I keep a stock of amo
One of oil and one of gold
I keep a place for Mary Anne
Soon she will come home
You're groping in the dark
The ticket takers count the men who can afford the arc
The ticket takers will not board
For the ticket takers are tied
For five and change an hour
They will count the passers by
They say the sky's the limit
But the sky's about to fall
Down come all them record books cradle and all
They say before he bit it
That the boxer felt no pain
But somewhere there's a gamblin' man
With a ticket in the rain
Mary Anne, I know I'm a long shot
But Mary Anne, what else have you got
I am a ticket taker, many tickets have I torn
And I will be your arc, we will float above the storm
Many years have passed in this river town
I've sailed through many traps
I keep a stock of weapons should society collapse
I keep a stock of amo
One of oil and one of gold
I keep a place for Mary Anne
Soon she will come home
Lyrics submitted by WinterLungs, edited by hemamorphy, jstanley
Ticket Taker Lyrics as written by Jeffrey Carl Prystowsky Benjamin Knox Miller
Lyrics © BMG Rights Management
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!
More Featured Meanings
The Best of Everything
Far from Home
Far from Home
i hear the seduction of new liberalistic pleasure in your cd
Death of Anna Karina, The
Death of Anna Karina, The
1
A Theme for Your Ego
A Loss for Words
A Loss for Words
1
Who do I have to kill
Escape from Earth
Escape from Earth
1
Love in a Vacuum
'Til Tuesday
'Til Tuesday
Well, in my opinion this song is about being a young & maybe a little naive &/or introverted girl and finding yourself loving a man who is at first very charming, carefree & outgoing, and seems at first to be without limits, as in
"There was a time
you opened up every doorway
you didn't mind if everything
wasn't your way"
then that man starts to gradually become more introverted & shows their more possessive/obsessive side to you as the relationship progresses, even while they keep up the appearance of being carefree & outgoing to everyone else,
"Don't pull away
that goes against what you told me
I look in your eyes
I realize what you've sold me
is love in a vacuum"
so you confront them about the way they're acting and of course they deny it,
"I think you've changed
but you insist that
that's not true"
quite possibly they are an addict of some sort, my guess would be cocaine, &/or showing very obsessive behavior towards you (early on in the video for this song we see the man hanging a picture up, it is a very large portrait of Aimee & it is prominently displayed in his/their apartment for the duration of the song), thus their "love in a vacuum",
"You look so strange, so distant
that you're hardly you
Now I can see
how you have been acting different
You say it's me
but I know
that it isn't
it's love in a vacuum"
but still you are in love with them and don't want to leave them and you know that they are truly in love with you and they don't want you to leave them either, maybe they are convinced you can save them from themself, maybe they are so broken that the possibility of an overdose &/or suicide attempt is very real and you want to get through to them that their behavior not only dangerous but it is also just pissing you off and if they don't wise up they run the risk of loosing you, as in the lines
"You will be lonely
if you leave me alone", so you want to save them but can't get through to them due to the addiction &/or emotional problems they have,
"Love in a vacuum
and that's not enough
love in a vacuum
You will be lonely
you'll be the only one who feels this way
You will be lonely
if you leave me alone
You will be lonely
you'll be the only one who feels this way
it's just not enough"
you want them to understand that the love they are giving you is not enough when it is filtered through the vacuum of their drug addiction &/or emotional impairment,
"You will be lonely
you'll be the only one who feels this way
it's just not enough
and just wait
you will be lonely
Love in a vacuum
Love in a vacuum
and that's not enough
Love in a vacuum".
'Love In A Vacuum' for me is a hauntingly truthful acute argument on the loneliness of obsession and almost inevitable loss of love that follows people who are broken in some way or another; the obsessives, the coke heads, the drunks, addicts or the just-plain-old emotionally broken; a razor sharp, lyrically driven, deceptively poppy, yet ultimately-depressing-in-the-best-way song.
Quintessential Aimee Mann.
I'm so surprised no one's commented on this song. It's gorgeous. Such a sweet love song tinged around the edges with the prescience of apocalypse. Perhaps the ticket-taker is not the best choice for a society that feeds on itself, values the men who "can afford the arc," but he is certainly the best choice for when he is the only arc, above the chaos with his solid valuables. There is also something pitiable in the narrator's hanging around an "old river town" stockpiling weapons, presumably waiting for both a woman and the collapse.
Another reading could be that the monotony of ticket-taking has wound up his psyche and made him into what Sherwood Anderson might call a grotesque-- someone fixated on only one aspect of their existence so as to ignore all other aspects and thereby turn in on themselves, exemplifying some spiritual malaise. I see this most prominent in that "Marianne" most likely snubbed him for a richer gentleman, and as a perfectly reasonable reaction, the ticket-taker has to make up for his lack of wealth in some other way. When she comes back to him after the sky caves in, he won't rub it in her face TOO much.
TL;DR It's one of the prettiest, most lyrically interesting songs I've heard in a long while.