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Of Course We Know Lyrics

The streets are just blankets and we sleep on their silky corpse
Covered up by them, why would we ever want to wake up?
Oh, no

Well, of course, of course, of course, of course
Of course we just do not know

What in hell are we here for?
We just do not know

Lord lay down, Lord lay down, Lord lay down your own damn soul
Lord lay down, Lord lay down, Lord lay down your own damn soul
Lord lay down, Lord lay down, Lord lay down your own damn soul

The air is like cotton that we wear wherever we go
Covered up by this, why would we ever want to try on your clothes?

Well of course, of course, of course, of course
Of course we just do not know

Well, Lord lay down, Lord lay down, Lord lay down
(Let down your guard)
Lord lay down, Lord lay down, Lord lay down your own damn soul
Lord lay down, Lord lay down, Lord lay down your only son

Of course we know
Song Info
Submitted by
mellow_harsher On Mar 08, 2015
7 Meanings

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Cover art for Of Course We Know lyrics by Modest Mouse

This song is simple and beautiful. God, I love this band.

Cover art for Of Course We Know lyrics by Modest Mouse

Such a brilliant conclusion to the album. Our justification as humans to the destruction of our planet. That we don't know why we are here or what we are supposed to do so we do what we want.

My Interpretation
Cover art for Of Course We Know lyrics by Modest Mouse

I love the birds singing at the very end of the song, this might sound stupid but from such a harsh yet poetic song taking on Christianity and all the bullshit it spews, it’s a faint sound of hope at the end, birds singing, love in all existence no matter what you were force-fed.

Cover art for Of Course We Know lyrics by Modest Mouse

What do you do with this line?

Lord lay down, Lord lay down, Lord lay down your only son

@Hosehound25 I think he's calling bullshit on it, to the myth, to Christianity, to it the doctrines we're fed

@Hosehound25 The whole song is questioning God and Christ. If it's all real. Isaac is pleading with God. He wants to know what it all means. However, he forgets faith. One must have faith. Nothing is revealed until the end.

Cover art for Of Course We Know lyrics by Modest Mouse

forgive me if someone has already made this point, but i was listening to invisible from the wwdbtses and noticed that theres a "of course we know" line about mid way through.

not sure what the reference means between the two songs but you guys have at it

Cover art for Of Course We Know lyrics by Modest Mouse

@Hosehound25 I think the world wasnt in dire straights 2000 years ago when Jesus was supposedly there. But it is now.. So if there was a time for Jesus it's now. Right now we have the capability of being amazing. We can stop all our problems if we work together. If we divide and give into our baser instincts we will eventually die out and we are nature's smartest product in 100s of millions of years and our intelligence is wrecking the planet. We overpopulate we are too successful. But with science and philosophy and creativity and manufacturing... With all our endeavors we may be the best thing life has actually produced. We need to reign in our destructive tendencies we need to live again as part of nature and not its slaveholder. So if there is a god and he put his son here. He should come back again. That's the feeling of the album to me.. But I reckon Isaac is an atheist like me. There is no god outside of us. Our best instincts to preserve all life and to flourish as a planet.. That's god.

@matteso80 Thanks for the thoughts, man. Matt? Mat here also (one t though…). I definitely understand the instinct to believe we are worse off today than we were 2,0000 years ago. There is so much injustice, pain, and suffering in the world that it’s hard to imagine a worse time than this. You are correct in that we are divided and that this division leads to many of the problems we see in the world. And we are the smartest and most capable beings on the planet and in the history of civilization. Yet, as you note, we cannot seem...

@matteso80 we are definitely better off now than compared to thousands of years ago. Don\'t buy that narrative that everything is awful and injust

Cover art for Of Course We Know lyrics by Modest Mouse

The first verse is about being on autopilot/day dreaming while being stuck in traffic. Also I think it's "course" instead of "corpse". If we were to wake up we'd see that we're just wasting our lives away going to work and coming home again day after day. But what the hell are we here for anyways? I guess we don't know. In the chorus he's saying that if God set all this up then he should come down and experience it too. "Lay down his soul" like we have to do to survive.

The second verse he's encouraging you to open your eyes and see that it's a beautiful world, even the touch of air on our skin should be something we appreciate everyday. This invisible air is better than any designer clothes - we should practice mindfulness, then we wouldn't feel the need to buy so much stuff which causes us to work long hours. Then again on the chorus he's like "come on God, do it, lay down your soul, let down your guard, and even bring your children into this world."

Finally he revisits the notion that we don't know what were here to do. Saying of course we do, we just suppress it. Taken as a whole the song is saying we can't ever get away from our true nature. We can fall asleep or get hypnotized going through the motions as consumers but it won't ever satisfy us. We need to be awake, aware, and mindful of every sensation, then we wont feel the need to work so much to try and fill that void.

 
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