This is a hauntingly beautiful song about introspection, specifically about looking back at a relationship that started bad and ended so poorly, that the narrator wants to go back to the very beginning and tell himself to not even travel down that road. I believe that the relationship started poorly because of the lines:
"Take me back to the night we met:When the night was full of terrors: And your eyes were filled with tears: When you had not touched me yet"
So, the first night was not a great start, but the narrator pursued the relationship and eventually both overcame the rough start to fall in love with each other:
"I had all and then most of you"
Like many relationships that turn sour, it was not a quick decline, but a gradual one where the narrator and their partner fall out of love and gradually grow apart
"Some and now none of you"
Losing someone who was once everything in your world, who you could confide in, tell your secrets to, share all the most intimate parts of your life, to being strangers with that person is probably one of the most painful experiences a person can go through. So Painful, the narrator wants to go back in time and tell himself to not even pursue the relationship.
This was the perfect song for "13 Reasons Why"
I think I'll go home and mull this over
Before I cram it down my throat
At long last, it's crashed, its colossal mass
Has broken up into bits in my moat
Rip the mattress off the floor
Walk the cramps off
Go meander in the cold
Hail to your dark skin
Hiding the fact you're dead again
Underneath the power lines, seeking shade
Far above our heads are the icy heights that contain all reason
It's a luscious mix of words and tricks
That let us bet when you know we should fold
On rocks, I dreamt of where we'd stepped
And of a whole mess of roads we're now on
Hold your glass up, hold it in
Never betray the way you've always known it is
One day, I'll be wondering how
I got so old, just wondering how
Never got cold wearing nothing in the snow
This is way beyond my remote concern
Of being condescending
All these squawking birds won't quit
Building nothing, laying bricks
Hold your glass up, hold it in
Never betray the way you've always known it is
One day, I'll be wondering how
I got so old, just wondering how
Never got cold wearing nothing in the snow
This is way beyond my remote concern
Of being condescending
All these squawking birds won't quit
Building nothing, laying bricks
Before I cram it down my throat
At long last, it's crashed, its colossal mass
Has broken up into bits in my moat
Rip the mattress off the floor
Walk the cramps off
Go meander in the cold
Hail to your dark skin
Hiding the fact you're dead again
Underneath the power lines, seeking shade
Far above our heads are the icy heights that contain all reason
It's a luscious mix of words and tricks
That let us bet when you know we should fold
On rocks, I dreamt of where we'd stepped
And of a whole mess of roads we're now on
Hold your glass up, hold it in
Never betray the way you've always known it is
One day, I'll be wondering how
I got so old, just wondering how
Never got cold wearing nothing in the snow
This is way beyond my remote concern
Of being condescending
All these squawking birds won't quit
Building nothing, laying bricks
Hold your glass up, hold it in
Never betray the way you've always known it is
One day, I'll be wondering how
I got so old, just wondering how
Never got cold wearing nothing in the snow
This is way beyond my remote concern
Of being condescending
All these squawking birds won't quit
Building nothing, laying bricks
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The Night We Met
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Great version of a great song,
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This, like all beautiful songs leaves itself open to all kinds of interpretations
The real telling line in the song to me is
"Far above our head are the icy heights that contain all reason"
This is a very poetic take on Socrates great line: "I know nothing except the fact of my ignorance"
The beginning of the song seems like the author is in a conversation and is being persuaded to give an opinion on something he's not quite sure about or maybe is afraid to confront for it might take him to a dark place that may distract him from material goals. I think that might be where the title comes from - Caring is creepy as opposed to ignorance being bliss "Never betray the way you've always known it is" is just another way of taking the easy way out in life by accepting the first theory presented to you as gospel truth and then self-righteously lay bricks of certainty that are built into nothing in the end because they cannot be proven.
The importance of life is to alway wonder - just never forget that your know nothing.
"Never got cold wearing nothing in the snow"
People who coat themselves with layers of beliefs that they are certain are true and are afraid of taking off those layer for fear of being naked in the cold. That is where the truth lies.