This is a sequel to 2001's "Reckless Abandon", and features the band looking back on their clumsy youth fondly.
I woke the same as any other day
Except a voice was in my head
It said seize the day, pull the trigger, drop the blade
And watch the rolling heads
The day I tried to live
I stole a thousand beggar's change
And gave it to the rich
The day I tried to win
I dangled from the power lines
And let the martyrs stretch yeah
Singing, one more time around
Might do it
One more time around
Might make it
One more time around
Might do it
One more time around
The day I tried to live
Words would you say
Never seem to live up to the ones inside your head
The lives we make
Never seem to ever get us anywhere but dead
The day I tried to live
I wallowed in the blood and mud with all the other pigs
Singing, one more time around
Might do it
One more time around
Might make it
One more time around
Might do it
One more time around
The day I tried to live, live
I tried
I woke the same as any other day you know
I should have stayed in bed
The day I tried to win
I wallowed in the blood and mud with all the other pigs
And I learned that I was a liar (one more time around)
I learned that I was a liar (one more time around)
I learned that I was a liar (one more time around)
I learned that I was a liar (one more time around)
Singing one more time around
(Might do it)
One more time around
(Might make it)
One more time around
(Might do it)
One more time around (might make it)
The day I tried to live, live
Just like you
Just like you
One more time around
One more time around
Except a voice was in my head
It said seize the day, pull the trigger, drop the blade
And watch the rolling heads
The day I tried to live
I stole a thousand beggar's change
And gave it to the rich
The day I tried to win
I dangled from the power lines
And let the martyrs stretch yeah
Singing, one more time around
Might do it
One more time around
Might make it
One more time around
Might do it
One more time around
The day I tried to live
Words would you say
Never seem to live up to the ones inside your head
The lives we make
Never seem to ever get us anywhere but dead
The day I tried to live
I wallowed in the blood and mud with all the other pigs
Singing, one more time around
Might do it
One more time around
Might make it
One more time around
Might do it
One more time around
The day I tried to live, live
I tried
I woke the same as any other day you know
I should have stayed in bed
The day I tried to win
I wallowed in the blood and mud with all the other pigs
And I learned that I was a liar (one more time around)
I learned that I was a liar (one more time around)
I learned that I was a liar (one more time around)
I learned that I was a liar (one more time around)
Singing one more time around
(Might do it)
One more time around
(Might make it)
One more time around
(Might do it)
One more time around (might make it)
The day I tried to live, live
Just like you
Just like you
One more time around
One more time around
Lyrics submitted by jt, edited by Mellow_Harsher, BigCheese, Mindspan, bboo_bboo, markydissod, Nomorebullsh.t
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More Featured Meanings
When We Were Young
Blink-182
Blink-182
No Surprises
Radiohead
Radiohead
Same ideas expressed in Fitter, Happier are expressed in this song. We're told to strive for some sort of ideal life, which includes getting a good job, being kind to everyone, finding a partner, getting married, having a couple kids, living in a quiet neighborhood in a nice big house, etc. But in Fitter, Happier the narrator(?) realizes that it's incredibly robotic to live this life. People are being used by those in power "like a pig in a cage on antibiotics"--being pacified with things like new phones and cool gadgets and houses while being sucked dry. On No Surprises, the narrator is realizing how this life is killing him slowly. In the video, his helmet is slowly filling up with water, drowning him. But he's so complacent with it. This is a good summary of the song. This boring, "perfect" life foisted upon us by some higher powers (not spiritual, but political, economic, etc. politicians and businessmen, perhaps) is not the way to live. But there is seemingly no way out but death. He'd rather die peacefully right now than live in this cage. While our lives are often shielded, we're in our own protective bubbles, or protective helmets like the one Thom wears, if we look a little harder we can see all the corruption, lies, manipulation, etc. that is going on in the world, often run by huge yet nearly invisible organizations, corporations, and 'leaders'. It's a very hopeless song because it reflects real life.
Plastic Bag
Ed Sheeran
Ed Sheeran
“Plastic Bag” is a song about searching for an escape from personal problems and hoping to find it in the lively atmosphere of a Saturday night party. Ed Sheeran tells the story of his friend and the myriad of troubles he is going through. Unable to find any solutions, this friend seeks a last resort in a party and the vanity that comes with it.
“I overthink and have trouble sleepin’ / All purpose gone and don’t have a reason / And there’s no doctor to stop this bleedin’ / So I left home and jumped in the deep end,” Ed Sheeran sings in verse one. He continues by adding that this person is feeling the weight of having disappointed his father and doesn’t have any friends to rely on in this difficult moment. In the second verse, Ed sings about the role of grief in his friend’s plight and his dwindling faith in prayer. “Saturday night is givin’ me a reason to rely on the strobe lights / The lifeline of a promise in a shot glass, and I’ll take that / If you’re givin’ out love from a plastic bag,” Ed sings on the chorus, as his friend turns to new vices in hopes of feeling better.
Trouble Breathing
Alkaline Trio
Alkaline Trio
While the obvious connections with suicide or alcoholism could be drawn easily, more subtly this song could be about someone who views the world through a negative lens constantly and how as much as the writer tries to show the beauty in the world, this person refuses to see it. It's one or another between the rope and the bottle. There is no good option for this person. They can't see it. Skiba sings it in a kind of exasperated way like He's tired of hearing this negative view constantly and just allowing that person to continue feeling the way they feel knowing he can't do anything about it. You can hear it when he says maybe you're a vampire.
Somewhere Only We Know
Keane
Keane
Per the FAQ on Keane's website, Keane's drummer Richard Hughes, stated the following:
"We've been asked whether "Somewhere Only We Know" is about a specific place, and Tim has been saying that, for him, or us as individuals, it might be about a geographical space, or a feeling; it can mean something individual to each person, and they can interpret it to a memory of theirs... It's perhaps more of a theme rather than a specific message... Feelings that may be universal, without necessarily being totally specific to us, or a place, or a time..."
With the nostalgic sentiment and the overall tone of the song, I think Keane is attempting to express a Portuguese term known as 'saudade', which does not have a direct English translation but roughly means "that which we remember because it is gone."
From Chris Cornell himself:
It's about trying to step out of being patterned and closed off and reclusive, which I've always had a problem with. It's about attempting to be normal and just go out and be around other people and hang out. I have a tendency to sometimes be pretty closed off and not see people for long periods of time and not call anyone. It's actually, in a way, a hopeful song. Especially the lines "One more time around/Might do it", which is basically saying, 'I tried today to understand and belong and get along with other people, and I failed, but I'll probably try again tomorrow.' A lot of people misinterpreted that song as a suicide-note song. Taking the word "live" too literally. "The Day I Tried to Live" means more like the day I actually tried to open up myself and experience everything that's going on around me as opposed to blowing it all off and hiding in a cave.
@arhodd do you have a link or reference for that??
@arhodd & @sokorny:<br /> web.stargate.net/soundgarden/articles/rs_1-12-95.shtml<br /> <br /> Rolling Stone interview from 1995.
Link Update:<br /> rollingstone.com/music/music-features/chris-cornell-the-rolling-stone-interview-79108/
I think it's the exact opposite, Timmay. Instead of trying to be like society, I think the figure protrayed in the song woke, deciding he was gonna go out, change the world, and do something memorable and worthwhile. At the very end he realizes that he's just like everyone else, no matter what he does, that he's not special. This is after the day is done, him reflecting on what's happened. The voice in his head when he woke up, for instance, was himself, but he's been distanced from that. In the morning, he was an idealist, but by the time he fell asleep, he was a realist, finally having realized that "words you say never seem to live up to the ones inside your head."
@Blind Opius The best way to help "yourself" is to help others. It's the fundamental concept of all religions. Don't tell me you're not religious. We all are to some degree.
Fools! It's basically their song that says how disgusted they are with the rest of the human race; how corrupt everyone is deep down - But in a first person, sarcastic tone. I really wish more people could put sarcasm meaningfully into a song like this. The day he "tried to live" is the day that Chris decided he would try to fit in with everyone else; and by doing so, he gave up all moral integrity for the purpose of just getting along and doing well, unfortunately.
@sommy yea i think the line "I walled in the blood and mud with all the other pigs" indicates that<br />
@sommy absolutely right! Living in the modern world requires you to lower your moral standards and wallow in the "blood and mud" with all the other pigs. It's a great song about the inner struggle as a person may want to be proactive and do the right thing, but in order to be part of society they have to take part in what society does, even the morally questionable things.
Since you're all so off-base I feel I have to set it straight.
This song is about existentialism. The references are all there, if you know your existentialist literature. Existentialism at its core is about getting off your ass and living life to the fullest because there's no god and no heaven and nobody else can live your life for you and once your life is over that's it.
A lot of the people who have commented seem to have very negative views toward capitalism. That's idiotic, of course: Chris Cornell is a capitalist! He makes millions of dollars off of his talents, and by buying his albums and being fans of his music you are all capitalists as well. The line "stole a thousand beggar's change and gave it to the rich" is NOT about capitalism, because capitalism (1) redistributes wealth more evenly than any other economic system and (2) is the opposite of theft, since under capitalism all exchanges are voluntary. Socialism and communism are systems which take money by force and place it into the pockets of the rich and powerful.
More than anything, this song is about accepting the fact that you are a member of the animal kingdom, and in doing so, accepting both the flaws and wonders of being human.
Your view on capitalism is just wrong. Its insanely unequal which should be blindingly obvious. You sound someone who is staring at the sky insisting that its actually yellow not blue. Moron.
@Nadaav Chris Cornell believes in God and Jesus and they are most definitely not pro-thisgreedyfuckeduphateful world.
@Nadaav <br /> <br /> You're so fucking wrong.<br /> <br /> I won't even explain to you how. You're taken. Cornell believes in Christ. His wife is a Christian ffs. <br /> <br /> Existentialism isn't all about atheism, or lack of belief in the metaphysical.
He said that this song contains some positiveness, especialy in the lines: "one more time around might do it, one more time around might make it". He tried to behave like everyone else and it didn't go so well, but he still carries a little hope one day he'll succeed his goal - to feel alive. In an interview I once saw, he admitted that though he has friends (after all, when you're this famous you obviously create an interest to your acquaintances) he tends to be alone. So at least in this period of time he probably felt that it's better to isolate himself from the outer brutal world.
In the day he tried to live he discovered a few things: He acts the opposite of what the mainstream society expects him, He gives up very quickly and let the others take the lead, while he crawls behind, When he talks, he only tries to please the people around him by not telling them what he really thinks, He finds that even when he's doing what's so called 'living', he'll still end up just the same as if he would'nt, He saw that for achiving something you want you have to fight over this with others as if it was a piece of meat, and that you can't win without step over the others skulls.
After he's coming out of his bed and discovers all these stuffes, he regrets that he even tried.
Maybe it's better to stay in bed with the door locked and windows closed and let the world to slowly fall apart around you. to let the wolves bite their own brothers and hide yourself silently beneath the safe ground.
I feel it.
Chris sings this song with emotion, makes me think it's more than a story about some guy he's thinking of. It's about trying to fit in and not being accepted, realising you're not a true person , you're just like everyone else you loathe, a liar, the day you tried to change something, the day you tried to live. This is one of those songs that SOME people can relate to.
Words you say never seem To live up to the ones inside your head
My favorite part of the song.. It is so hard to communicate
it is defenitely about waking up and deciding that it was time to 'live' and 'win'...which meant to join the rat race, lie, support capitalism...
anyone know what this verse means??
The day I tried to win I dangled from the power lines And let the martyrs stretch Singing
Honestly, before reading the lyrics I always heard it as "I dangled from the power lines and left them all astretch", as if to say he was made of something heavier than those thick metal cables - super-hero or extra-terrestrial like - and impervious to any ill effects of doing so. I still hear it that way...
The day you try to succeed, the day you try to win, to make it to the top, you can fail miserably and hurt people, or win miserably and hurt people. Basically, the cheaty way to get to the top of the proverbial "totem pole" is by letting others suffer. "Dangled from the power lines" to me refers to being high up, but being barely able to support yourself in a risky position like this.
With the comment daddio made on the lines
The day I tried to win, I dangled from the power lines and let the martyers strech
I think that means, hanging from power lines would be instant death for anyone, and you would fry yourself doing it. Martyers, those willing to die for a cause, would stretch upward to try to save him, thus, becomming a martyer by dying to save his life. I think his meaning was to kill himself or try to kill himself and kill those who are willing to sie for his cause, in otherwards, it would be pointless to save him, because he would already be dead. Making their effort utterly worthless.
I might be 100 percent wrong, but it goes with the rest of the song, stealing from the poor, giving to the rich, taking from people who are needy and giving to those who are not. Trying to live as those who have no heart, no soul, in other words, living like most people do day by day.
I might be wrong....I usually am.
This song obviously explains a lot lyrically but Chris' vocal and emotional input is simply astounding. The message of the song is a man that has been depressed for a very long time and he tries to change his life by getting out of bed and being active, forgetting that he has been seperated from society he isn't accepted by anyone and decides it would of been better to stay in bed and live another day feeling like death!