Mouth To Mouth

Ive always thought this was about how religion is nothing more than a carnival (Hence roddys keyboards) and how it has only survived via word of mouth (Just keep on passing it mouth to mouth to mouth..).

The the bit about dressing up the dead man could refer to people making more of him than he actually was.. The bit about Water and Wine I gather to be a placebo effect.

I thought the song was more about how this person thinks somebody else is more sexually interested in them than what they really are, so they believe it, tell their friends about it, but the person is not very interested in them in reality. Kind of like a delusion.

Actually, the keyboards were influenced by Middle Eastern music.

yeah your right about the middle eastern thing.

I dunno if this song means anything reallly, it can efnitiely be interpreted lots of ways. one point i can make is that to me 'tying the knot' means only one thing and thats marriage

Whether it's about marriage or not, it's definitely about delusion. And the combo of keyboards and guitar on this one are just sick! One of three bright spots on their worst album, Ashes to Ashes and Stripsearch were also great.

Well, spacemunky, to each their own, but I like this album a lot better than The Real Thing. Something about young Patton's vocals grates on my nerves from time to time...

Crack Hitler's analysis seemed the best to me. I guess I can see the marriage point of view, too.

I believe "tying the knot" refers to "tying your own noose" or sealing your own fate. The "you" does this by fully embracing the message given to him. I think it's interesting that the "I" in the song is fully aware that his message is false, a legend that the subject believes is completely true. He gives "water"/ "a wet noodle" to the subject that he believes is "wine"/ "my tongue". Both verses refer to the subject fooling himself into believing something that isn't anything special is really something intoxicating and revelatory. The line about peeling his skin and exposing the nerves is about how sensitive the subject becomes, completely thin-skinned.

There seem to be two analogies associated with "Mouth to Mouth". The first verse refers to the subject spreading the message by mouth, person to person. In the second verse, by pairing the reference to the messengers tongue, seems to make it analogous to CPR, the subject believes he's receiving new life but CPR is just breathing hot air into another's lungs.

The "dead man" is either the subject, a person who has no life, only a hollow message, or if we're talking religion it's about beautifying the religion's messiahs and prophets without being able to truthfully speak for them.

While the song has the obvious religious allusions of "water into wine" and bringing a dead man back to life it doesn't necessarily have to deal with Christianity. The music is middle-eastern so it could deal with Islam but it could really be about any dogmatic belief, spreading false messages to the masses

this is one of my favourate songs, I like crack hitlers analysis, well some of it anyway.

seems to be about disintegration in marriage

'you tied the knot / a legend's what you bought'

I definitely agree with the last comment. To push things further, I think it's about someone getting married for all the wrong reasons, and all the wrong reasons are like a veil that keeps them from seeing the neglect/abuse coming from their partner. Or, the person they married isn't the same person anymore and they refuse to see it. ("I can't dress up a dead man...")

ok this is just silly. what on earth would you be passing "from mouth to mouth" about a marriage? who would be the "why not them?" ... and what's that got to do with a dead man, or water-wine. this is clearly about religion and the passing down of beliefs from generation to generation. hence "mouth to mouth".