Sit Down

Tim Booth once said that "this is a song about absolute misery, feeling entirely alone, it's about being awake at 4am and having no one to talk to" It's meant to be comforting for people in this situation, saying that they're not alone, and they'll get through it. It's a very personal song for him.

It's about the universality of bewildernment and suffering. He's saying that he's been through this, and he sympathises with all those going through it.

It's a bit like Everybody Hurts by REM, but less sappy.

I love this song, like most people who have ever heard it. It's universal because we can all relate to that feeling of being a stranger or an outsider in life, and it's powerful to hear another weirdo reaching out to you through the dark. :)

Here are some general comments made about the lyrics by Tim Booth for The Guardian:

"The opening line, "I'll sing myself to sleep, a song from the darkest hour," refers to my insomnia. I was writing at 2-3am. The lines "Now I'm relieved to hear that you've been to some far-out places, it's hard to carry on when you feel all alone" were me thinking of Patti Smith and Doris Lessing.

They both connected to me when I felt very alone and misunderstood. Throughout my teens, I'd had an undiagnosed illness and my skin was almost yellow. When I was 21, I'd almost died, so I was feeling pretty tortured in those days.

That line "I swung back down again" is about the mood swings I used to go through. I was meditating a lot to try and find some meaning to it all, and you can get quite high on that. Then you come back down to reality. I was celibate, no alcohol, vegetarian and living a monkish life, but when you're meditating for days at a time you get to some pretty far-out places. So "If I hadn't seen such riches I could live with being poor" is about the places I reached through meditation – the riches are psychological. When I'm writing, I let this stuff pour out spontaneously. If I start thinking about it too much, I usually bugger it up.

The lyrics about empathy with the sick and mentally ill were probably my way of wanting to be a beacon for other people in the way Smith and Lessing were for me. The line "Those who find themselves ridiculous, sit down next to me …" somehow stops the song being pompous."

One of my favourite EVER tunes.

Possibly one of my favourite songs ever. I have a very vivid memory as a young kid of hearig it on top of the pops and instantly loving it.

genius, how could anyone not like this

Well he is obviously a manic depressive, but i'd guess considering how many great song writers are (were) that could go without saying.

This song is about drugs and depression - thats what they said in an interview. Its someone rich who has spent all money on high-class drugs, lost it all and is spiralling down out of control taking so meone with him. As Morrissey put it (and a strong champion for James when they made it big in the 1980s) there is no debata - no debate.

Also: the facts behind this song are that Tim Booth, as a teenager, was feeling awful and depressed and then there were a couple of books (or was it songs? or poems?) that he read that made him feel like he wasn't going crazy, and that at least someone else knew what was going on with him. The song is really about that feeling of empathy, and "you're not alone".

Moodswings is one of Tim Booth's common threads throughout his lyrics.