A lyricist with Ryan's genius obviously knows that the best writing has no one specific meaning, and, judging by his other songs, I'd say he loves to play with irony and double meanings. His songs are sort of like Hemingway's iceberg theory, in that he doesn't tell you everything but you can fill in the holes with what can be inferred. I love his poetry (yes, I consider the lyrics to be that), especially songs like this, which can be so confusing to decipher.
I have several different ideas. One is that this could be a sort of continuation of "I Write Sins..." (which comes right before it on the cd, by the way), since it's still in a church and dealing with hypocrisy, and maybe (this is really out there) Esteban is the waiter from whom he heard that "the groom's bride is a whore" (which is why he'd be thanking him, as he sings about the hypocrisy he's discovered). I'm not sure I completely would endorse the last part, but just thought I'd throw that out there.
I think it can definitely be a commentary on music these days, where people worship celebrities more than God, and so the music scene has become the new church. I like what someone said about "God be thy witness" being replaced with "YOU'll be thy witness," showing the egocentrism in contemporay society. During the chorus, I think "strike up the band" alludes to both people who jump on the bandwagon and also concerts in general, where the "congregation" of fans sings along "like you mean it," although "no," they don't, and they "don't...get it" either. Still, the bands will put up with this ("don't you move") as long as they have fans. the whole "stay where I can see you. douse the lights" bit surely refers to being onstage and not being able to see the audience, and then once the lights are doused they're on equal footing, and can that both the band and the audience are putting on a "show tonight", being fake etc. like everyone else has already said.
I guess I'm not really contributing much new, but if I had to pick an interpretation I'd say it's about the "faux sermons" of some musicians and the equally false fans who follow them blindly, complaining of "faux afflictions"...perhaps an emo commentary, who knows. Okay that's all I've got.
A lyricist with Ryan's genius obviously knows that the best writing has no one specific meaning, and, judging by his other songs, I'd say he loves to play with irony and double meanings. His songs are sort of like Hemingway's iceberg theory, in that he doesn't tell you everything but you can fill in the holes with what can be inferred. I love his poetry (yes, I consider the lyrics to be that), especially songs like this, which can be so confusing to decipher.
I have several different ideas. One is that this could be a sort of continuation of "I Write Sins..." (which comes right before it on the cd, by the way), since it's still in a church and dealing with hypocrisy, and maybe (this is really out there) Esteban is the waiter from whom he heard that "the groom's bride is a whore" (which is why he'd be thanking him, as he sings about the hypocrisy he's discovered). I'm not sure I completely would endorse the last part, but just thought I'd throw that out there.
I think it can definitely be a commentary on music these days, where people worship celebrities more than God, and so the music scene has become the new church. I like what someone said about "God be thy witness" being replaced with "YOU'll be thy witness," showing the egocentrism in contemporay society. During the chorus, I think "strike up the band" alludes to both people who jump on the bandwagon and also concerts in general, where the "congregation" of fans sings along "like you mean it," although "no," they don't, and they "don't...get it" either. Still, the bands will put up with this ("don't you move") as long as they have fans. the whole "stay where I can see you. douse the lights" bit surely refers to being onstage and not being able to see the audience, and then once the lights are doused they're on equal footing, and can that both the band and the audience are putting on a "show tonight", being fake etc. like everyone else has already said.
I guess I'm not really contributing much new, but if I had to pick an interpretation I'd say it's about the "faux sermons" of some musicians and the equally false fans who follow them blindly, complaining of "faux afflictions"...perhaps an emo commentary, who knows. Okay that's all I've got.