Defeat You

This is my favorite song by smashmouth, it is what we are. I love this line: "Yeah you cry when your wounded and you laugh when they bleed"

This is a great song. Everything about it is good, and actually seeing the lyrics makes it so much better. This is the first time I have looked at them put down in text.

Heh. For the longest time I thought this was about some kind of ubermensch named "Bon" who knew kung fu et cetera.

Neo: I know kung fu! Bon: Norris roundhouse Neo: O noez! I'm dead!

It's about someone winning against someone not playing by the rules, and how it makes it that much better to defeat them. For example if anyone has ever watched Kenny vs. Spenny would know Kenny always cheats, and any time Spenny wins it's well deserved. While you'd rather have them play with the rules, its even better that they don't and you still win.

I think it's just a song about kickin' ass and takin' names.

I think this song is trying to acknowledge the competitive nature of humans. We're born with "a kung fu spine".

We are also social beings and try to like each other "Hey I know where you're from, It makes it that much nicer to meet you"

But if we´re being totally honest, we also just like to be better than others. We compare ourselves to others, what they have achieved and it just boosts our confidence if we've 'defeated' another. "Hey I know what you've done It makes it that much better to defeat you"

However I think the song shows the negative effects of comparing yourself to others and extremely striving to be better than others as well. The most poignant in this part: "Would you do anything whatever it takes Jacks in the road yeah fix the breaks It's the instinct that's got us locked up tight And it's the madness that's keeping us up all night " Can you control your competitiveness or will you let it take you over? Instead of trying to get better than others by improving yourself, ending up sabotaging or even hurting others.

The last verses show someone who has lost their control over it and possibly ended up in court defending their actions that have gone too far. Having lost their empathy to others, just feeling the desire to "feed" those "evil powers" by hurting someone really bad. It's not about become better yourself (you're wounded and crying), but destroying another (laughing while they're bleeding). "Your honor your honor its not me It's the invisible visible evil powers that be Untraceable insatiable having to feed Yeah you cry when your wounded and you laugh when they bleed "

I might be way off base here but I have always pictured a bunch of people playing competitive video games with each other.

"Born is a human with a kung fu spine" that's your typical fighting game character, and "Equipped with a detector of what's on your mind" That's the video game controller in your hand with which you tell the game character how to act. "to get to the top of the hill" maybe a stretch but a lot of game have a king of the hill as a game mode. "Jacks in the road yeah fix the breaks" plenty of racing/kart racing games where this is a mechanic. "it's the madness that's keeping us up all night" its almost a cliche, staying up late playing video games. "Born is a human with mechanics to win; Born is machine with a human tucked in" I think this is just hammers in the dynamic of these individuals interacting through the video game. "Your honor your honor its not me; It's the invisible visible evil powers that be" and this is when you cry fowl because your button got stuck, or input lag, or you totally push left and not forward, left, LEFT.

This is probably totally wrong, but I like to interpret this as a song about defiance to God. It alludes to the nature of humans and how we're built a certain way, but we're expected to behave in the exact opposite way. During the chorus, God is judging you, and you're saying that you've always been exactly what he made you to be, and if he sees that as wrong, then you're glad it's wrong. Try reading the lyrics with this in mind, and it all makes sense.