Mediate

The lyrics to this song are just "grate". (sorry)

OK, I happen to know the origin of "Like Pretty Kate". WAY back in 1991 in Seattle I dated for about 6 months a girl named Katie. There is absolutely no doubt5 she was incredibly beautiful (Stunningly beautiful), in fact I would go so far as to say she as the most beautiful girl I have ever seen. We had a great relationship and she very well could be my wife today, the problem is I was promoted to a Sales Manager job at AT&T down in Portland.

We tried to make it work for about four months but we saw less and less of each other, and we sort of mutually decided to call it quits.

Anyway, while we were dating we were in my car and this song came on. She then casually mentioned when INXS came to town several years before, she and a girlfriend were invited backstage for a band party. They were working on this song and trying to figure out words that rhyme with "ates". One of the band member said "What about 'Like Pretty Kate'".

They obviously liked the line as it ended up in the song. TRUST ME, Katie was not the type to lie about herself, and I might not even have known this little fact had it not both heard it on the radio. She just mentioned it off-the-cuff like it was no big deal.

She never claimed any other brushes with music or movie starts. I would bet my life the story she told was the truth. I know her last name but in the interest of privacy I will not incude it.

Anyway, THAT IS the origin of where the "pretty Kate" reference came from. It is absolutely the truth, I have no reason to lie.

Katie; if you happen to read this you may want to fill in more of the blanks as I am going just on what Katie told me two years after it occured.

Nick Tanner MOSFET

this song is an homage to Bob Dylan's "Subterreanean Homesick Blues."

see the video for it...

i think this song is about all the problems in the world today (try not to hate (descrimination), love your mate (hate), a white/black state (racism), etc). i wanna find another song that has all the words rhyme like this and still have it make sense, i think it's the coolest thing ever :) i wake up to this song every morning.

I don't think he was talking about the year 1998. I also know that Andrew Farriss wrote the song, and Michael helped him 'finish it off' so I don't believe Michael had a fascination with the year 1998. I watched the video for mediate, the video is made up of each member holding flash cards of significant words in the lyrics. When it got to 'at 98 we all rotate' what is shown on the flash card is a date. The date was 9.8.1945 (it specifically said 1945). I googled this date and what came up was the atomic bombings of Hiroshima. So the full meaning of the song I am not sure of, but if this information helps to break down the songs meaning then wonderful.

"At 98, we all rotate" My thoughts on this was not the year 1998, the the age 98. Reincarnation? Not my thought when I was graduating high school in 1989...

Not a lot of logic in these posts. So I thought I would explain. The lyrics are written a few phrases at a time. "Mediate" means to "to work with opposing arguments to bring about an agreement". So the lyrics do just that, in sections. Overall the song is about love vs hate....

The first part is about society's need to end hate (which is a common theme in INXS and Hutchence's lyrics... notice the constant peace signs in the video?) Also, don't forget that the Farris Brothers were going to be a Christian band in the early years of forming their band... they were very religious, though Michael rebelled against the Church and Christianity...

"Hallucinate Dessegregate Mediate Alleviate Try not to hate Love your mate Don't suffocate on your own hate Designate your love as fate"

He is saying society sees humanity incorrectly... people need to stop segregating people into special groups and instead mediate the issues and alleviate the burdens and end hate... love your partner, stop the hate and accept that you can have a path in life filled with love.

"A one world state As human freight The number eight A white black state"

A one world state a la Naziism, New World Order, one race nation, etc etc... in which humans are viewed as products... the number 8 symbolizes "chance", such as the Ying yang, or the black/white 8 ball in billiards, which ends the game when shot. A white/black state meaning two things: 1) viewing the world in white/black (living with an ignorant mind), 2) a world where white and non-whites are segregated (which comes back around to the beginning of the song).

"A gentle trait The broken crate A heavy weight Or just too late Like pretty Kate has sex ornate

A gentle trait is characteristic of light, positivity, and good things about humanity, but those things can still not overcome the burdens placed on individuals by society... humans once again treated like products, cargo in a box, breaking from the weight of our existence... maybe its too late to overcome these problems.

"Like pretty Kate has sex ornate"... I think this is straight forward. A woman is all dolled up and has very delicate complex sex, not rough animal-like sex. But maybe he is saying that Kate has missed her opportunity for rougher sex because she is too focused on her appearance? Or maybe her period is late and she is going to have a child and now her appearance doesn't matter? Idk this one.

The next verse plays back and forth with the idea of mediation of our existence...

"Now devastate -- total ruination Appreciate -- absolve ruination and see the value Depreciate -- lose value Fabricate -- create from scratch Emulate -- copy what is good The truth dilate" -- and now you can see the truth

"Special date The animal we ate Guilt debate The edge serrate A better rate The youth irate"

This being straight forward.... two people having a special dinner date, eating meat and then debating being guilty for eating meat (Hutchence was a vegetarian), as the knife cuts the meat, the conversation is also a hot topic, such as one that younger people are angry about (the youth irate). Refraining from eating meat helps one to live longer ("a better rate" in life).

I know the video shows a special date being Hiroshima, but that was not the intention when the song was written.

Back again to playing off of the mediate concept with the lyrics a little bit...

"Deliberate - discuss our existence with each other Fascinate - gain enlightenment Deviate - lose enlightenment Reinstate - learn from our mistakes Liberate - regain enlightenment and and break through the oppression To moderate - use resources moderately Recreate - continue our existence Or detonate - end our existence Annihiliate - really end our existence Atomic fate - really really end our existence Mediate" - discuss this problem

Now the mediate concept is dropped and the lyrics discuss just one side to the discussion, most likely being the solution that Hutchence/Farris agree with:

"Clear the state - remove the government's power Activate - bring about change Now radiate - things will get better A perfect state - things will become perfect Food on plate - no world hunger Gravitate - make change The Earth's own weight - make change on a global scale Designate your love as fate" - make love your guiding force

"At ninety-eight we all rotate".... this phrase brings it all together to explain that we are all one. Every humans' internal temperature is approximately 98 degrees. We all live and exist at the same temperature, all over the world.

The song initially comes off as a bunch of random words that rhyme, but there is quite a bit of meaning and intention in the lyrics. Aside from a short piece about vegetarianism, the song is about how we need to communicate with each other so that we can overcome our problems and end hate.

[Edit: Fixed grammar/punctuation]

I remember listening on the radio when it was announced that Michael Hutchence committed suicide. Just a few moments ago, I listened to this song and heard the lyric: "At 98, we all rotate". I wondered if the year 1998 was at least poetically referenced. I recalled that it would have been around this year that Hutchence died. So, I looked on Wikipedia and learned he Hutchence was found dead on November 22 1997--pretty close to the start of 1998.

What, perhaps, was Hutchence's fascination with the significance of the year 1998?

First off, attributing your theories to Hutchence is silly. Farriss is the sole songwriter. Hutchence assisted him, in exchange for help on other lyric problems he was solving on another song. This is well known within their partnership.

As far as the 98 reference, I've always taken that quite literally. The human body temperature is 98.6 and we are all rotating on the earth as it travels around the sun.

I have no answers on Kate. I mean, they were working on a lot of rhymes here so it probably just worked. And I bet every Kate that met them before the song was released probably thinks it's about her.

Although an Australian would normally think of temperatures in Celsius, I have always supposed that "at 98 we all rotate" was simply a reference to human body temperature, which is 98.6°F. Using Fahrenheit and dropping the "point six" is necessary to make it rhyme. And, as such, the line is saying: We all share a basic human commonality.

There's not a lot of coherence to the lyrics. Forcing the rhyme in each phrase means that many lines come across as fragments, capturing some aspect, perhaps, of human life, but having not much more in common.