This song makes me feel such a mix of emotions. Excitement, wonder, sadness, nostalgia, hope, anxiety. It makes me want to cry. The lyrics seem to be too abstract to be about a simple plot. Alvin probably represents some amorphous "thing", like childhood, or innocence, and the song shows what happens as that gets fades away and gives way to maturity and the "real world", and the the longing to go back to the stage of innocence and childhood with lyrics such as "ice cream man come to save the day". I don't think the speaker is old enough to be dying, I think it's just his childhood that's dying. He's trying to get past it and grow up, but it's so difficult to just let go of the times when you were young and carefree--no thoughts of wars, politics, cheating, beating, robbery, murder, disease, etc. Just happiness.
We may never know the real meaning, but that's what the song makes me feel, and it's incredibly powerful. Amazing song.
This song makes me feel such a mix of emotions. Excitement, wonder, sadness, nostalgia, hope, anxiety. It makes me want to cry. The lyrics seem to be too abstract to be about a simple plot. Alvin probably represents some amorphous "thing", like childhood, or innocence, and the song shows what happens as that gets fades away and gives way to maturity and the "real world", and the the longing to go back to the stage of innocence and childhood with lyrics such as "ice cream man come to save the day". I don't think the speaker is old enough to be dying, I think it's just his childhood that's dying. He's trying to get past it and grow up, but it's so difficult to just let go of the times when you were young and carefree--no thoughts of wars, politics, cheating, beating, robbery, murder, disease, etc. Just happiness.
We may never know the real meaning, but that's what the song makes me feel, and it's incredibly powerful. Amazing song.