The song lyrics were written by the band Van Halen, as they were asked to write a song for the 1979 movie "Over the Edge" starring Matt Dillon. The movie (and the lyrics, although more obliquely) are about bored, rebellious youth with nothing better to do than get into trouble. If you see the movie, these lyrics will make more sense. It's a great movie if you grew up in the 70s/80s you'll definitely remember some of these characters from your own life. Fun fact, after writing the song, Van Halen decided not to let the movie use it.
i was born in 1968
i was born in '68
and im born again!
fresh face for the stenciled walls.
debord is always right here
and get scared again-'cause i'm reborn.
i am reborn red!red!red!
i was born in '68
and im born again!
fresh face for the stenciled walls.
debord is always right here
and get scared again-'cause i'm reborn.
i am reborn red!red!red!
Lyrics submitted by d_lacy
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Before a live performance on the EP Five Stories Falling, Geoff states “It’s about the last time I went to visit my grandmother in Columbus, and I saw that she was dying and it was the last time I was going to see her. It is about realizing how young you are, but how quickly you can go.”
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There is still an amazing amount of hope and will in the lyrics; and the lyrics themselve rank and easy five. If only music was stronger it would be one of those great radio songs that you hear once a week 20 years after it was released. The imagery is almost tear-jerking ("City lights lay out before us", "Speeds so fast felt like I was drunk"), and the idea of starting from nothing and just driving and working and denigrating yourself for a chance at being just above poverty, then losing in the end is just painful and inspiring at the same time.
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it's obvious. france 1968. debord is a genius. yes.
The ironic thing being that they're singing about a revolt that failed when the students involved left the barricades and went home for the summer. To other college students. Historical fetishism. Restrategize.
it doesn't matter if a particular set of protests "failed". victory is ours anyway because of somehting wider that was happening and still is. the protests were just a literal manifestation, of course it will fall apart eventually. "68" signals something else, a whole new way of thinking and doing, you know this. i don't think it is historical fetishism, its just putting oneself in a broad tradition of thought, something which is new for a hc to do. <br /> <br /> <br /> Debord still is always right.<br /> <br /> "The images detached from every aspect of life fuse in a common stream in which the unity of this life can no longer be reestablished. Reality considered partially unfolds, in its own general unity, as a pseudo-world apart, an object of mere contemplation. The specialization of images of the world is completed in the world of the autonomous image, where the liar has lied to himself. The spectacle in general, as the concrete inversion of life, is the autonomous movement of the non-living."
hc band*<br /> <br /> also full text of Debord's Society of the Spectacle if anyone is interested:<br /> <br /> library.nothingness.org/articles/SI/en/pub_contents/4
Yes. Hampshire alumni too, no surprise what Orchid wrote about in songs.
Hampshire? I always thought they went to Amherst. My best friend goes to Hampshire now.
Oh well. At least they raised the level of discourse in hc a little.