Sonic Youth - Dirty Boots Lyrics & Meanings

Cover art for Dirty Boots lyrics by Sonic Youth

by freeter mcbean

19y ago

ooh first post

yeah i just downloaded this guy for the first time today. here's what i think:

the first main point is the jelly roll; it's mentioned once in the first stanza and once in the second, and not strongly linked itself to anything else on first glance, so its the sparsest element that describes the world in the song.

the most obvious theme comes through in the sexual atmosphere. words like sex, crack, tongue, finger, making out, but more importantly the feminine - pink - sexual aspect.

hi de ho is also important. it links with the title - dirty boots - to give the sense of a labourer's work. the truck adds to this.

finally, a christian-evil mood is partly included, with the words satan and witch, and the number of the beast. rather than being a particularly christian element i think it's probably just there to make you feel uncomfortable.

the narrative part runs weakly chronologically from early to late night every night in this world. the candle is what attracts you to find sex, like a workshift whistle. the jelly roll is nothing but pure sweetness, the one that will make you soft if you eat it every day. the ride is an invitation - if you wanna go - but resonating with the midnight eye, which means the female sex as much as it does privacy, it seems to become the object, your ride for the night. the ride, or method of transport to and from the candle, is sexualised this way as well, as is entering the vehicle - get on below. pink as a verb, pinking out as the method, suggests a lifestyle of becoming pink and nothing more, a living pink dream. the phrase 'the crazy way' makes you feel yourself in that situation, bringing you into the pink momentarily. finger on the love seems like you have love exactly where you want it, where your finger touches the pink.

the second stanza uses the mechanics of the situation more, and builds on the suffocation from the first, while adding the element of seeming to describe the whole system. i couldnt get six-sex-six for a bit, but it's 666-sex, wrong sex. by luck, and satellite wish refer to the mechanism of encounter: first and foremost, you have relinquished control over the specifics, and you always have a list of numbers if your luck is down - make it just enough. this desperate scramble, and chaotic effects, also come through in the next line; the witch in the coffee truck. the phrase rock the road sounds like rock and roll to me, and suggests this as the origin of this whole culture. the social aspect, or where this culture opens into standard social relations, is the recounted tale of the jelly rollin.

also: the title has the second image of the dirty fuck-me boots.

i think that's about it...

in terms of the sound, the verse riff evokes an old and pervertedly-designed machine, and thurstons voice for most of the song seems breathy and impotent, lending the whole thing the image of a system for spaying humans, but one that people work towards keeping in place. the anger in his voice and the guitars at the end suggest that everyone knows this at some level - or at least the listener does now, and the frustration comes through in the gap between the two themes combined in the title - dirty boots for fucking, dirty boots for labouring.

whaddaya think?