In regards to the meaning of this song:
Before a live performance on the EP Five Stories Falling, Geoff states “It’s about the last time I went to visit my grandmother in Columbus, and I saw that she was dying and it was the last time I was going to see her. It is about realizing how young you are, but how quickly you can go.”
That’s the thing about Geoff and his sublime poetry, you think it’s about one thing, but really it’s about something entirely different. But the lyrics are still universal and omnipresent, ubiquitous, even. So relatable. That’s one thing I love about this band. I also love their live performances, raw energy and Geoff’s beautiful, imperfectly perfect vocals. His voice soothes my aching soul.
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this album was my first love as a tiny child and this song has haunted me ever since.. its enigmatic refrain and cryptic lyrics have confused me for years but in spite (or perhaps because) of that it has remained a fav track.
listening now i finally feel i can unpick some of the riddles. the title 'Honestly now' seems anything but honest considering the seemingly nonsensical lyrics.. but i do now believe it’s looking to impart something honestly... it's just what it is describing is difficult and complex...
what i believe this song is about are the conditions of modern (american) society. 'Safety's just danger.. out of place' refers to the displaced violence societies depend on to exist. the lyrics are addressed to a ‘Sister’ and serve to guide her through the confusion of living in a treacherous world where nothing is as it seems.
‘Sister’ could be referring to a nun or more generally a female both tying into prominent themes in the lyrics of resistance and oppression. the verses themselves can roughly be divided thematically into Resistance, Truth, Absurdity and Acceptance..
Resistance (verse 1) the first two lines are the most instructive and least ambiguous of the entire song ‘Either you stand for something Or you get knocked down for nothing’ resist with what you can control or you will be controlled. there is no escape.. and many don't understand this (last lines of the verse)
Truth (verse 2 & 3) what is truth in a world full of distraction and misinformation (‘people playing tricks of the mind’)? controlled by great occlusive powers, shadowy conspiracies (‘shadows only follow behind’) set in motion at the very inception of society (battle of Malvern's hill). The Sister is urged to be still inside the whirlwind.
this theme continues into the next verse
to find truth in this world we need to imagine everything turned on it’s head (‘if fate were to follow fortune, clarity trail distortion’). we live in the distortion. to reveal reality we need imagination and to pay attention to the concealed dangers ('Sister on alert') that represses histories and erases the traces of itself ‘pay close attention fingerprints in the dust, footprints that leave no trace’.
Absurdity this verse is a continuation of the theme of turning things on their head from the previous verse and the absurdity of living in a world where nothing is as it seems, where safety is danger. ‘To be hammering pith Like a poet with a loss for words Trying to describe an angel's face’ these are interesting lines imo, there is clearly a parallel between the lyricist and the poet, both struggling to describe something elusive and impossible.. but where the poet is trying to describe ‘an angel’s face’ a conventional romantic image of beauty and purity, the lyricist is disillusioned. the lyricist has seen thru the idealism of the poet, whose words only service the Church, an institution of oppression and control. the poet’s words lull and nullify resistance where the lyricist’s invigorate it, and so altho similar to the poet the lyricist is also the opposite, the poet turned on their head..
Acceptance the song doesnt seem to end very optimistically. it describes a battle we are destined to lose, to be constantly ‘coming off second hand’. but the Sister is urged not to unravel, even when everything seems to spiral into something larger. the final lines seem to point to some kind of acceptance, there is ‘nowhere to go’ except ‘lawless travel’ returning us to the opening theme of resistance in an unjust society. the final line (‘and an end to infiny’s space’) could mean many things but to me suggests a kind of coming into being or self recognition, where the promises of boundless possibility whispered to you as a child fall away, and what's left is seeing yourself as you are and the designs society has in store for you.
i hope if anything this reading of the song has prompted further thought in you.. i would love to hear other ideas because i couldnt find much on it.. i feel it really is a powerful and beautiful and haunting song and i can barely scratch the surface of what it is getting at