Howl

This seems to be an allusion to Springsteen's "Thunder Road". Springsteen's anti-hero made his best pitch to Mary to run away with him, but we never get to know her answer, I guess I always assumed it was "yes". Not Brian Fallon.

Perhaps Mary didn't like being called "you ain't no beauty, but hey you're alright".

In this universe, Fallon picks up the story after Mary turns him down. It seems that Mary becomes educated and travels instead of running away. Now, she is back, and the anti-hero is still there, sorta waiting for her - and maybe a little hurt and jaded as he chides her "does anything move you since you're educated now". He's done chasing - "you can find me, I'm on the hood", yet hopes there is still magic left somewhere, maybe on the radio. He understands why she turned him down, with her doubts and fears, and seems to fondly remembers her and there seems to still be hope there.

Other Allusions: "do you hear the thunder" - Thunder Road "in the way your dress would wave" - "Mary's dress waves" "find me on the hood" - "all th redemption I can offer girl is beneath this dirty hood" "oh radio, oh radio" - "as the radio plays, Roy Orbinson singin' for the lonely" "is there any magic left" - "show a little faith, there's magic in the night"

It's always about Mary with Brian. I'm pretty much in total agreement with Mike. The graduation gown torn up in the last verst of Thunder Road is what starts this story. Mary has made it through school, and the old mechanic back in Jersey is still stuck out in Atlantic City or something like that riding around listening to the waves and the radio in his old car. I think that Mary and the Mechanic, or anti-hero from Thunder Road are both lonely though. The chorus "like you waited on his call, and made your plans for great escapes" suggests that the girl waited for the mechanics call while she was away, and that she maybe wanted him to come with her. The second chorus is all about how the mechanic never got to ask the question, or never got Mary to stay, or to come back.

In the end though, they're both lying alone. Mary in her bed in silence, the magic maybe gone from her life as she has a 9 to 5, and has to "shake it out" every morning just to get out of bed; and the mechanic on the hood of his car still dreaming big, and still howling about Mary and what could have been if she hadn't doubted him, or he hadn't doubted her.

I think that the last lines are really what matters too. Bless your words, bless your doubts, or waters and doubts, because it shows the speaker isn't angry about the situation, and maybe believes that both he and Mary are in better places now, her or his doubts, saving them from heart break, and maybe allowing him to love her forever even if he cannot have her.

This song comes and goes so fast.

Seems like he's singing to someone he used to be close to (or at least wanted to be). Someone who's changed. "There used to be a movement in the way your dress would wave." I'd imagine she's sort of settled down.

But he's not quite over her. "If you wanna, you can find me..." But in the end, he ends up singing only to the radio. He asks the radio if there's still some magic left. Magic that she seems to have lost.