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Marilyn Moore Lyrics
[Thurston]
Sound asleep 'til night until day
frustrated desire turns you away
and turns you insane
over and over
you get to a point
to make it disappear
and you're always believing and believing in fear
over and over and over and over
and over and over
over again
Marilyn Moore
it's always a headache the size of a tow truck
she's full of disorders, depends what you're used to
she's talking of trances of truncheons in battle
of bruises from bottles that never get better
bad baby bitching she screams at the door
hammer in hand and her head to the floor
Marilyn Moore
Sound asleep 'til night until day
frustrated desire turns you away
and turns you insane
over and over
to make it disappear
and you're always believing and believing in fear
over and over and over and over
and over and over
over again
she's full of disorders, depends what you're used to
she's talking of trances of truncheons in battle
bad baby bitching she screams at the door
hammer in hand and her head to the floor
Marilyn Moore
Song Info
Submitted by
shut On Dec 24, 2001
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I'm Pretty certain this song was written about Marilyn Moore, one over the survivers of an attack by Peter Sutcliff (The Yorkshire Ripper). Sutcliff was a Schizophrenic who murdered Murdered Prostitutes during the 19070's. this explains the lines such as "frustrated desire turns you away and turns you insane over and over" i feel asif the first section is sutclif talking to himself about his mental anguish, then he see's marilyn moore (a prostitute) walking along and decides that he's going to kill her; he inticer her into his car and drives to a desserted area. he then suggests they go to the back seat and as shes leaving the car he get's his hammer and goes to hit her. only he trips up and doesn't do as much damage as he could have and she only collapses. "hammer in hand and her head to the floor"
he then drives off.
all information on this was from http://www.execulink.com/~kbrannen/victim14.htm
This song is making an analogy between Marilyn Monroe (a Hollywood icon who had a troubled existence) and an average woman with her own, everyday kind of troubles. Kind of a deconstruction of media myths, humanizing idolized people...typical SY stuff for the period. Which is to say, it's a fascinating and great song.
When I first heard the song I was sure it was Thurston Moore imagining a marriage to Marilyn Monroe - there’s surely only one ‘Marilyn’ and in the context of a Sonic Youth song, only one ‘Moore’. The Yorkshire Ripper connection makes a lot of sense too especially given the hammer reference, perhaps Thu was prompted to ponder when reading about the Ripper case...also a UK band from the mid 80s called Sutcliffe Jügend (Youth) may have prompted his interest. I think the song is a conflation of both the real and imagined MMs... a real dream.
Wow, no comments? this would be my third favorite SY song