Why Won't They Talk to Me?

What strikes me the most about this song is Kevin Parker's sincerity, he basically speaks for all the so-called "loners" in the world when he sings these lines. It's great that he pops out of his shell to sing these and many other great words to whoever wants to hear it without ever ceasing to sound alone and tired.

I find it great that he seems to find a way out by admitting that he really doesn't care about it anyway. It's true, once you get to talk to people you find out that it really is better not being involved with them. "They just talk about themselves all day", that has to be one of the most striking lines when it comes to describing human relationships and the whole Internet-era that we are all involved in.

I get what he's saying, and the fact that I made an account on this site to write this is a good proof of that. Why would I join this site if it wasn't for the need of sharing an opinion that otherwise I would have no way of expressing?

This is a beautiful album/band that has changed me in many ways.

Raw, confessional and candid demonstration of the train of thought and the roller-coaster emotions that accompany rejection and a wounded sense of self... How to make sense of it all and deal with that nagging feeling of knowing you are not wanted anymore, or at all?

Kevin Parker smoothly leads us through the lonely inner process of trying to make sense of the world and the self once again with a bruised ego and shattered hopes that unsettle one's coherent look on life...

Through its extended, musically and lyrically progressive opening, the song carries us along from the initial confessional "I'm so alone" to the dismissive "I don't need them, and they don't need me", towards more practical "I guess I'll go home, try to be sane; try to pretend none of it happened", to self-pitying "Lonely old me" in one breath. It escalates up to cathartic outbursts of hurt feelings and a demand for answers in the heartfelt and repeated "Why won't they talk to me?"

This catharsis runs its course, calms down and leads to the climatic "But I don't really care about it anyway..." The truth is that he does care, and no matter how much he tries to be dismissive of the significance of what he has been denied, we know it is untrue -- so does he... Hence, the seamless transition to the raw cries of: "Why won't they talk to me?", encore...

The song is an honest, unpretentious exercise on the oscillation of feelings associated with being cast out and left alone with an aching ego... Hurting, disappointment and pain lie underneath the surface, pronounced especially with the repeated yet subtly confessional "I thought I was happy..."

Even though the superego takes over to 'win' it for him in spite of everything, with the best-revenge-is-living-well idealization that is "One day I'll be a star and they'll be sorry", the overwhelming emotions that accompany rejection and the nagging question of "why" end up taking the center stage 'till the end.

He runs, but cannot hide from a hurting, bruised ego, and his threatened sense of self and the world, so he cries out...

To me it feels like this song is really comber and self reflective. It's almost as if Parker is trying to convince himself that "I don't need them and they don't need me." It's almost like something a kid would say after not being allowed to hang out with the cool kids at the playground.

His emotions change so rapidly from line to line, going from feeling sorry for himself to prideful to all out depressed. This song really touches me, because I feel like I have felt all those emotions before. Trying to rationalize and make sense of experiences that will make me feel good instead of depressed. Sometimes this involves warping the truth in your own little world, but you will always know it is a lie.

Personal relationships are so complicated because they are so troublesome, but necessary for survival. We are social animals but it's so hard to feel social when you see what we are capable of. It makes you want to just stay inside and not bother.

This song is great, and so is the entire album. My #1 of 2012 for sure.

I'm the first one in comment that this is an amazing song! Sometimes it is unnecessarily talk with people that simply don't will understan you, there's a lot of vanish and ego in most of people.

Isn't he singing "why won't YOU talk to me?" sometimes. In the last refrain it really seems like he's singing this.

If true, is it a breakup song? Did she leave him because he's not in the clique anymore? Or does "they" represent all the girls who've left him?