Unluck

Again, this song is about being an only child, and perhaps James' resentment of that. Being an only child myself, I totally relate to this song in a way. I read "only child, take good care, I wouldn't like you playing, falling there" as perhaps his parents' protection of him and perhaps how he felt trapped as a child because of his parents being too overprotective of him. I see "treated walls" as a bubble of some sort, caging him in from other people and the dangers of the outside world. Who knows? Maybe I'm reading into this too much, but I just read Unluck as the fact that as an only child he's the only thing, so to speak, his parents have, so they'll do any thing to protect him from danger.

I cant shake the imagery of a hospital warden within this song, and a patient dialogue who is waiting on a organ donor of some sort. The title (which I think are really telling in James Blake songs) converts an adjective ('unlucky') to a noun (unluck), making the concept of having no luck perpetual and contained. The second line 'care for me' seems to me a plea from within the warden, because it is defined by the following lines - 'when crossings call out / one of three' which I see to be one donor out of three available (so in a sense he has limited chances). The second stanza seems to me the speaker addressing his 'only child' to take care when he is gone, and what to avoid; 'falling there.'