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"
You talk about your revolution, well, that's fine
But what are you going to be doing come the time?
Are you going to be the big man with the Tommy gun?
Will you talk of freedom when the blood begins to run?
Well, freedom has no value if violence is the price
Don't want your revolution, I want anarchy and peace
You talk of overthrowing power with violence as your tool
You speak of liberation and when the people rule
Well ain't it people rule right now, what difference would there be?
Just another set of bigots with their rifle-sights on me
But what about those people who don't want your new restrictions?
Those that disagree with you and have their own convictions?
You say they've got it wrong because they don't agree with you
So when the revolution comes you'll have to run them through
You say that revolution will bring freedom for us all
Well freedom just ain't freedom when your back's against the wall
You talk of overthrowing power with violence as your tool
You speak of liberation and when the people rule
Well ain't it people rule right now, what difference would there be?
Just another set of bigots with their rifle-sights on me
Will you indoctrinate the masses to serve your new regime?
And simply do away with those whose views are too extreme?
Transportation details could be left to British rail
Where Zyklon be succeeded, North Sea Gas will fail
It's just the same old story of man destroying man
We've got to look for other answers to the problems of this land
You talk of overthrowing power with violence as your tool
You speak of liberation and when the people rule
Well ain't it people rule right now, what difference would there be?
Just another set of bigots with their rifle-sights on me
Vive la revolution, people of the world unite
Stand up men of courage, it's your job to fight
It all seems very easy, this revolution game
But when you start to really play things won't be quite the same
Your intellectual theories on how it's going to be
Don't seem to take into account the true reality
'cause the truth of what you're saying, as you sit there sipping beer
Is pain and death and suffering, but of course you wouldn't care
You're far too much of a man for that, if Mao did it so can you
What's the freedom of us all against the suffering of the few?
That's the kind of self-deception that killed ten million Jews
Just the same false logic that all power-mongers use
So don't think you can fool me with your political tricks
Political right, political left, you can keep your politics
Government is government and all government is force
Left or right, right or left, it takes the same old course
Oppression and restriction, regulation, rule and law
The seizure of that power is all your revolution's for
You romanticize your heroes, quote from Marx and Mao
Well their ideas of freedom are just oppression now
Nothing changed for all the death, that their ideas created
It's just the same fascistic games, but the rules aren't clearly stated
Nothing's really different 'cause all government's the same
They can call it freedom, but slavery is the game
Nothing changed for all the death, that their ideas created
It's just the same fascistic games, but the rules aren't clearly stated
Nothing's really different 'cause all government's the same
They can call it freedom, but slavery is the game
There's nothing that you offer but a dream of last years hero
The truth of revolution, brother...is year zero.
But what are you going to be doing come the time?
Are you going to be the big man with the Tommy gun?
Will you talk of freedom when the blood begins to run?
Well, freedom has no value if violence is the price
Don't want your revolution, I want anarchy and peace
You talk of overthrowing power with violence as your tool
You speak of liberation and when the people rule
Well ain't it people rule right now, what difference would there be?
Just another set of bigots with their rifle-sights on me
But what about those people who don't want your new restrictions?
Those that disagree with you and have their own convictions?
You say they've got it wrong because they don't agree with you
So when the revolution comes you'll have to run them through
You say that revolution will bring freedom for us all
Well freedom just ain't freedom when your back's against the wall
You talk of overthrowing power with violence as your tool
You speak of liberation and when the people rule
Well ain't it people rule right now, what difference would there be?
Just another set of bigots with their rifle-sights on me
Will you indoctrinate the masses to serve your new regime?
And simply do away with those whose views are too extreme?
Transportation details could be left to British rail
Where Zyklon be succeeded, North Sea Gas will fail
It's just the same old story of man destroying man
We've got to look for other answers to the problems of this land
You talk of overthrowing power with violence as your tool
You speak of liberation and when the people rule
Well ain't it people rule right now, what difference would there be?
Just another set of bigots with their rifle-sights on me
Vive la revolution, people of the world unite
Stand up men of courage, it's your job to fight
It all seems very easy, this revolution game
But when you start to really play things won't be quite the same
Your intellectual theories on how it's going to be
Don't seem to take into account the true reality
'cause the truth of what you're saying, as you sit there sipping beer
Is pain and death and suffering, but of course you wouldn't care
You're far too much of a man for that, if Mao did it so can you
What's the freedom of us all against the suffering of the few?
That's the kind of self-deception that killed ten million Jews
Just the same false logic that all power-mongers use
So don't think you can fool me with your political tricks
Political right, political left, you can keep your politics
Government is government and all government is force
Left or right, right or left, it takes the same old course
Oppression and restriction, regulation, rule and law
The seizure of that power is all your revolution's for
You romanticize your heroes, quote from Marx and Mao
Well their ideas of freedom are just oppression now
Nothing changed for all the death, that their ideas created
It's just the same fascistic games, but the rules aren't clearly stated
Nothing's really different 'cause all government's the same
They can call it freedom, but slavery is the game
Nothing changed for all the death, that their ideas created
It's just the same fascistic games, but the rules aren't clearly stated
Nothing's really different 'cause all government's the same
They can call it freedom, but slavery is the game
There's nothing that you offer but a dream of last years hero
The truth of revolution, brother...is year zero.
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i like this song. it raises a lot of questions about government and what form and role it should take in society.
one of my favorite crass quotes "freedom has no value if violence is the price"
this was the first Crass song i ever heard. From there i went nuts with these guys. they kick ass.
This song is good for pointing out differences between anarchist and communists. In a perfect world communist would be successful anarchy but communist fucked everything up and the word communism now means oppression. Communist countries try to rally the masses with the words of Marx and Mao but "their ideas of freedom are just oppression now" People are just stupid for trying to continue the communist movement. It doesnt lead anywhere and ends up killing millions of innocents and the name of progress.
The ideals of communism remain unchanged, whether or not until now they have been distorted by tyrants and murderers. The ideals of democracy have been equally distorted, but many still rally behind them. Regardless of how decent ideals have been abused, they are still something to strive for... though Crass points out wonderfully that violence cannot be the method.
communism and democracy both end up killing millions of innocent lives and both dont intend to until someone comes along to fuck shit up
In this song, Crass (as anarchists) are criticising all Communist (big C) revolutions and their violent methods. They're also criticising the authoritarian systems which have always been set up after these revolutions. The song strongly emphasises the anarchist idea that systems like this are not communism at all (true communism should be libertarian and a form of anarchism) -- rather state capitalism.
Furthermore, Crass are making the point that government is government, and you can't "free" the people from it only to set up another one with a different name. People will only be truly free when there is no state and no private ownership of land and the means of production.
Just to clarify, not all Communists are Marxist/authoritarian. I'm an Anarcho-Communist. The song is a tirade against authoritarian Communists.
Specifically this song was targeting the Socialist Workers Party, a UK Trotskyist party that campaigns for revolution but has a reputation in some quarters for being internally authoritarian. Crass had recently had a serious dispute with some of their activists. Of course it is also aimed more generally at authoritarian communism as other comments suggest.
As others have pointed out, communism and anarchism are quite close. I prefer to see anarchism as a sort of idealised end point in the same way that neo-liberalism can never be fully actualised. In the same way that neo-liberals describe an economy in which every economic transaction and every individual contract is negotiated at an infinitesimal level, anarchism describes a world of ever fluxing relationships within and between communities without an outside authority. We normally associate communism with authoritarianism although that is an utter perversion. This song is about the tension between those truly of the left and the macho-left warriors who would impose their ideals on everyone else. Hardly what communism is or has ever been about. Essentially communism/anarchism is democracy on steroids. So without consent, it is nothing.
There is a line missing above. After
So don't think you can fool me with your political tricks
it should go
Political left or political right, you can keep your politics