What if Michael is not a biblical reference but is a reference to Becker and Fagan's good friend, running buddy, and longtime musical college Michael McDonald?
To me the song sounds like someone who has been up all night partying but something went wrong and the night ended up in the emergency room. Now at his friend's bedside he is trying to rationalize everything. (I'm no to blame. You know my reputation for playing a good clean game.)
Maybe the friend OD'ed or there was a car wreck. Suddenly the drugs from Paraguay and the booze ("make mine a double, Sam") and the "outlaw" lifestyle (stocking face and a gun) don't look so romantic and fun.
He is exhorting his friend Michael to live, to turn that heartbeat over again. Imagine watching as the doctors use the cardio shock paddles.
There is a certain fatalism in the part about warning the corpse not to cuss and drink all night and seeing him laid to rest ticket in hand.
Zombie see and zombie do. He's saying we've seen this before, other friends dying, we know better and still we do it again. But please, Michael, don't die. I will be a better person, I promise.
@RobinB Not bad! Of course, it it were literally true, it would be part of the history of Michael McDonald. But it need not be literally true, to be a vision inspired by, and extrapolated from, a bad night of partying together.
@RobinB Not bad! Of course, it it were literally true, it would be part of the history of Michael McDonald. But it need not be literally true, to be a vision inspired by, and extrapolated from, a bad night of partying together.
Try this one on for size.
What if Michael is not a biblical reference but is a reference to Becker and Fagan's good friend, running buddy, and longtime musical college Michael McDonald?
To me the song sounds like someone who has been up all night partying but something went wrong and the night ended up in the emergency room. Now at his friend's bedside he is trying to rationalize everything. (I'm no to blame. You know my reputation for playing a good clean game.)
Maybe the friend OD'ed or there was a car wreck. Suddenly the drugs from Paraguay and the booze ("make mine a double, Sam") and the "outlaw" lifestyle (stocking face and a gun) don't look so romantic and fun.
He is exhorting his friend Michael to live, to turn that heartbeat over again. Imagine watching as the doctors use the cardio shock paddles.
There is a certain fatalism in the part about warning the corpse not to cuss and drink all night and seeing him laid to rest ticket in hand.
Zombie see and zombie do. He's saying we've seen this before, other friends dying, we know better and still we do it again. But please, Michael, don't die. I will be a better person, I promise.
Whaddaya think?
@RobinB Not bad! Of course, it it were literally true, it would be part of the history of Michael McDonald. But it need not be literally true, to be a vision inspired by, and extrapolated from, a bad night of partying together.
@RobinB Not bad! Of course, it it were literally true, it would be part of the history of Michael McDonald. But it need not be literally true, to be a vision inspired by, and extrapolated from, a bad night of partying together.