The song lyrics were written by the band Van Halen, as they were asked to write a song for the 1979 movie "Over the Edge" starring Matt Dillon. The movie (and the lyrics, although more obliquely) are about bored, rebellious youth with nothing better to do than get into trouble. If you see the movie, these lyrics will make more sense. It's a great movie if you grew up in the 70s/80s you'll definitely remember some of these characters from your own life. Fun fact, after writing the song, Van Halen decided not to let the movie use it.
I'm going back to 505
If it's a seven hour flight or a forty-five minute drive
In my imagination, you're waitin' lyin' on your side
With your hands between your thighs
Stop and wait a sec
When you look at me like that, my darlin', what did you expect?
I'd probably still adore you with your hands around my neck
Or I did last time I checked
Not shy of a spark
The knife twists at the thought that I should fall short of the mark
Frightened by the bite, though it's no harsher than the bark
The middle of adventure, such a perfect place to start
I'm going back to 505
If it's a seven hour flight or a forty-five minute drive
In my imagination, you're waitin' lyin' on your side
With your hands between your thighs
But I crumble completely when you cry
It seems like once again you've had to greet me with goodbye
I'm always just about to go and spoil the surprise
Take my hands off of your eyes too soon
I'm going back to 505
If it's a seven hour flight or a forty-five minute drive
In my imagination, you're waitin' lyin' on your side
With your hands between your thighs and a smile
If it's a seven hour flight or a forty-five minute drive
In my imagination, you're waitin' lyin' on your side
With your hands between your thighs
Stop and wait a sec
When you look at me like that, my darlin', what did you expect?
I'd probably still adore you with your hands around my neck
Or I did last time I checked
Not shy of a spark
The knife twists at the thought that I should fall short of the mark
Frightened by the bite, though it's no harsher than the bark
The middle of adventure, such a perfect place to start
I'm going back to 505
If it's a seven hour flight or a forty-five minute drive
In my imagination, you're waitin' lyin' on your side
With your hands between your thighs
But I crumble completely when you cry
It seems like once again you've had to greet me with goodbye
I'm always just about to go and spoil the surprise
Take my hands off of your eyes too soon
I'm going back to 505
If it's a seven hour flight or a forty-five minute drive
In my imagination, you're waitin' lyin' on your side
With your hands between your thighs and a smile
Lyrics submitted by dark kirby
505 Lyrics as written by Alex Turner
Lyrics © Sony/ATV Music Publishing LLC
Lyrics powered by LyricFind
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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"
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@[Diderik:33655] "Your a holiday!" Was a popular term used in the 50s/60s to compliment someone on their all around. For example, not only are they beautiful, but they are fun and kind too ... just an all around "holiday".
I think your first comment is closer to being accurate. The singer/song writers state "Millions of eyes can see, yet why am i so blind!? When the someone else is me, its unkind its unkind". I believe hes referring to the girl toying with him and using him. He wants something deeper with her, thats why he allows himself to be as a puppet (even though for her fun and games) as long as it makes her happy. But he knows deep down that she doesnt really want to be serious with him and thats what makes him.
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Same ideas expressed in Fitter, Happier are expressed in this song. We're told to strive for some sort of ideal life, which includes getting a good job, being kind to everyone, finding a partner, getting married, having a couple kids, living in a quiet neighborhood in a nice big house, etc. But in Fitter, Happier the narrator(?) realizes that it's incredibly robotic to live this life. People are being used by those in power "like a pig in a cage on antibiotics"--being pacified with things like new phones and cool gadgets and houses while being sucked dry. On No Surprises, the narrator is realizing how this life is killing him slowly. In the video, his helmet is slowly filling up with water, drowning him. But he's so complacent with it. This is a good summary of the song. This boring, "perfect" life foisted upon us by some higher powers (not spiritual, but political, economic, etc. politicians and businessmen, perhaps) is not the way to live. But there is seemingly no way out but death. He'd rather die peacefully right now than live in this cage. While our lives are often shielded, we're in our own protective bubbles, or protective helmets like the one Thom wears, if we look a little harder we can see all the corruption, lies, manipulation, etc. that is going on in the world, often run by huge yet nearly invisible organizations, corporations, and 'leaders'. It's a very hopeless song because it reflects real life.
Plastic Bag
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“Plastic Bag” is a song about searching for an escape from personal problems and hoping to find it in the lively atmosphere of a Saturday night party. Ed Sheeran tells the story of his friend and the myriad of troubles he is going through. Unable to find any solutions, this friend seeks a last resort in a party and the vanity that comes with it.
“I overthink and have trouble sleepin’ / All purpose gone and don’t have a reason / And there’s no doctor to stop this bleedin’ / So I left home and jumped in the deep end,” Ed Sheeran sings in verse one. He continues by adding that this person is feeling the weight of having disappointed his father and doesn’t have any friends to rely on in this difficult moment. In the second verse, Ed sings about the role of grief in his friend’s plight and his dwindling faith in prayer. “Saturday night is givin’ me a reason to rely on the strobe lights / The lifeline of a promise in a shot glass, and I’ll take that / If you’re givin’ out love from a plastic bag,” Ed sings on the chorus, as his friend turns to new vices in hopes of feeling better.
It's about Alex Turner going to his girlfriend's house (505) to dump her after being warned by his mother. He is clearly still in love with this girl, "I probably still adore you with your hands around my neck", and tells how he will find it difficult to break up with her. The line "if its a seven hour flight or a forty five minute drive" shows his anxiety. The line means that it takes forty five mintutes to drive to her house, but it seems to take "seven hours" to get there on this occasion. The line "the knife twists at the thought that I should fall short of the mark" means that he is worried that he will not be able to break up with her, and he also writes "but i crumble completely when your cry", and he does not feel able to go through with the task ahead His coming is a surprise, and when they break up even more, "i'm always just about to go and spoil the surprise".
Agree. It's about how hard the break up is for him because he's still in love, but he wants to act like he is not. i lived this, very sad :c
Wrong. Wrong. Wrong. It's about a long distance relationship.
@scottBITW Thank you. I can't believe that what @caspar said is the most upvoted interpretation on here. It couldn't be farther from the meaning. @scottBITW is right, it is about long distance relationships.
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this song is amazing
"But I crumble completely when you cry" kills me
same
same here, love that he shows such vulnerability, but it freaking makes me wanna crumble!
seems I'm not the only one who gets identified with this piece..<br /> <br /> I will change a bit of the lyric... "But I crumbled completely when you cried"
completely agree, oooh the way he sings that line with such emotion! Simply beautiful <3
@,tAn-x such an incredible line
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"I crumble completely when you cry," that part gives me goosebumps <3 especially cuz its Alex Turner singing it.
I like this song a lot. When he says, "I'd probly still adore you with your hands around my neck," I'm pretty sure that he's saying even when this girl drives him crazy he will always love her.
everyone is wondering what 505 is....My best guess is the number of an appartment or hotel room.
"It seems like once again you've had to greet me with goodbye," I guess here he is saying that everytime he gets to see her it seems like he always has to leave right away and they don't get a lot of time together.
And the part about the hands between your thighs....not sexual. I do that when i'm cold or just laying in my bed sad or bored.
Anyway, love this song...It's mature of the Arctic Monkeys
@arcticmonkeysgirl 505 is new Mexico area code
i take back what i said about the 'no evidence he is in love with this girl' its sounds like hes absolutely tortured about this girl but is unsure if he's in love with her or not 'I probably still adore you With your hands around my neck Or I did last time I checked'
okay now other people comment iv gone on enuf !!
well impressed with this song, i'm glad too because as much as i like brianstorm...this show's a good progression. as for what it's about maybe tour and leaving a loved one, not really thought about it as only jsut heard it. love the lines about thinking of her lying there in his imagination though.
Well, everyone has pretty much done a nice job of summing up the meaning of this song. I definetly think its a great song. It's definetly one of their more meaningful songs =]
me and franksmellman are cool cause we signed up just because of this song, :P. it sucks i was looking at this like a week ago and no one had commented it yet, and i really wanted to be first cause you just know in a year there will like a 1000+ comments on this song cause thats how good it is!!!
Here's an extract from MOJO magazine, its what Mr Turner said the song is about : "penned on a late-night train journey alone from Philadelphia to New York to rendezvous with his then-girl-friend in the hotel room of the title"
i love this song sooo much, lyrics "I probably still adore you, With your hands around my neck, Or I did last time I checked" really get me, because i know that feeling, and can relate to it.
thankyou AM!!!!
Best son on the album? Maybe but, Do Me a Favour, Teddy Picker, This House Is a Circus.... I could say them all, only song i skip is brianstorm.. lol, the same thing happened to Danni California
meh, hope it helped, depsite the ramblin'
Wicked song and a great different side to the AM
I always suspected this song was about him going to meet a girl he loved, though my first interpretation was about an ex that the singer missed. I originally saw 505 either as their apartment number they used to live in or maybe a time frame (may 2005). lines like
"I probably still adore you With your hands around my neck Or I did last time I checked"
"The knife twists at the thought that I should fall short of the mark"
"But I crumble completely when you cry It seems like once again you've had to greet me with goodbye"
can all just show how completely in love with this girl he still is and it's like she doesnt accept or doesnt want him
im pretty sure i understand the song, ive been trying to work it out for a couple of days and listening to it and stuff, cause its had me curiouss, but here goess!
im sure everyone agrees about the fact that 505 is a room that holds some sort of significance to alex turner, and the second line is also pretty self explanitary. he will travel any amount of time to reach 505. in the third line, everyones convinced that is has some sexual meaning to it. im convinced otherwise, tho i might be wrong. i think the position of someone putting there hands between their thighs reminds me of someone in the fetal position, and the hands are where they are so they remain warm. if everyones right about this being about him touring, this girl who he has to leave will need to keep herself warm, and i think this might be the image hes trying to show. anyways. the next three lines confuse me, even though they seem pretty simple. im not sure if hes trying to say something like, duh.. of course i still love you. or something. the hands around the neck symbol is about the one who you will always love, even if they hate you and want you dead. i think him saying "im not shy of a spark" is like saying, he doesnt care if shes angry at him or if she tries to start a fight, because he just wants to be with her no matter what. the next line tells me that hes unsure if he meets her expectations, or if hes going to come back and shes found someone better, and that the "mark" would have been moved. im not quite sure about the next line.. but i think "middle of adventure, what a perfect place to start" is like, maybe they started in the middle of his rise to fame, and that would be the adventure. "but i crumble completely when you cry" is sooo sweet, its like he cant stand the pain shes going through because of their seperation. the "greet me with goodbye" is about how he has to leave so quickly, and it feels like just as hes saying hello, he has to leave. im not sure about what the suprise is, maybe him coming home? or something like that, and im not sure how hed ruin the suprise.. but yeaaaaaaaaa. i think i rambled a bit but i thought i had to share what i thought :)
I agree with many things (:
That song is great in its simplicity. "505" was the hotel room in New York where Alex Turner's then-girlfriend resided for a short period of time. He's intending to split up with her, but in his heart of hearts he doesn't want to. I believe we've all had the same feeling at some point in our lives.