In regards to the meaning of this song:
Before a live performance on the EP Five Stories Falling, Geoff states “It’s about the last time I went to visit my grandmother in Columbus, and I saw that she was dying and it was the last time I was going to see her. It is about realizing how young you are, but how quickly you can go.”
That’s the thing about Geoff and his sublime poetry, you think it’s about one thing, but really it’s about something entirely different. But the lyrics are still universal and omnipresent, ubiquitous, even. So relatable. That’s one thing I love about this band. I also love their live performances, raw energy and Geoff’s beautiful, imperfectly perfect vocals. His voice soothes my aching soul.
Can you feel a little love?
As your bony fingers close around me
Long and spindly
Death becomes me
Heaven, can you see what I see?
Hey you pale and sickly child
You're death and living reconciled
Been walking home a crooked mile
Paying debt to karma
You party for a living
What you take won't kill you
But careful what you're giving
Mmm
There's no time for hesitating
Pain is ready, pain is waiting
Primed to do its educating
Unwanted, uninvited kin
It creeps beneath your crawling skin
It lives without, it lives within you
Feel the fever coming
You're shaking and twitching
You can scratch all over
But that won't stop you itching
Can you feel a little love?
Can you feel a little love?
Dream on
Dream on
Mmm
Mmm
Blame it on your karmic curse
Oh shame upon the universe
It knows its lines
It's well-rehearsed
It sucked you in, it dragged you down
To where there is no hallowed ground
Where holiness is never found
Paying debt to karma
You party for a living
What you take won't kill you
But careful what you're giving
Can you feel a little love?
Can you feel a little love?
Dream on
Dream on
Can you feel a little love?
Can you feel a little love?
Dream on
Dream on
Dream on
Dream on
Dream on
Dream on
As your bony fingers close around me
Long and spindly
Death becomes me
Heaven, can you see what I see?
Hey you pale and sickly child
You're death and living reconciled
Been walking home a crooked mile
Paying debt to karma
You party for a living
What you take won't kill you
But careful what you're giving
Mmm
There's no time for hesitating
Pain is ready, pain is waiting
Primed to do its educating
Unwanted, uninvited kin
It creeps beneath your crawling skin
It lives without, it lives within you
Feel the fever coming
You're shaking and twitching
You can scratch all over
But that won't stop you itching
Can you feel a little love?
Can you feel a little love?
Dream on
Dream on
Mmm
Mmm
Blame it on your karmic curse
Oh shame upon the universe
It knows its lines
It's well-rehearsed
It sucked you in, it dragged you down
To where there is no hallowed ground
Where holiness is never found
Paying debt to karma
You party for a living
What you take won't kill you
But careful what you're giving
Can you feel a little love?
Can you feel a little love?
Dream on
Dream on
Can you feel a little love?
Can you feel a little love?
Dream on
Dream on
Dream on
Dream on
Dream on
Dream on
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Like in many others of Martin's songs this one, too, is about the ambiguity and difficulty of coping with the most fundamental human emotions and needs.
It's about the longing to feel alive even if you ruin your health by the means you use in the course of it. It's about the desperate need to receive love and affection and the deep fear of being turned away. So you're not daring to open yourself to someone, to give something in return. Desire comes like a sickness over you because of the moral implications, the implanted guilt in you.
Like in a self-fulfilling prophecy you expect to get hurt and so you act in a (self-)destructive way that allows no other outcome. But feeling pain seems to be better than feeling nothing at all. Thus instead of pursuing your own free will or dreams you yield to something you call fate (or karma in this case). You're like a martyr for your own philosophy - it's pointless.
After all this you're then left with one last question that may lead you out of your gloomy existence: Are you still able to feel that bit of love, to live that bit of dream that will keep you alive and give you at least the hope on happiness? Or do you settle in your darkness, find some modus vivendi.
Sounds depressive? Well, it's Depeche. But I think in many people's lives you will find aspects of those conflicts Martin's songs describe. Love is a many splintered thing.
This is an awesome song. It's got a wonderful beat to it. The lyrics are so freakin powerful too. "Blame it on your karmic curse, oh shame upon the universe. It knows it's lines; it's well rehearsed..." :nod:
@wlraider_girlie Yeah I love the lyrics to this song, they're a little bit funny but they're still serious and dark.<br /> They remind me of Douglas Adams or Terry Pratchett's writing.
I think bana had it right. Martin writes the songs, and it seems to me that this song is perfect for Dave Gahan... Remember how his habit nearly did him in? He was dead for 2 minutes. Certain lines in this song probably refer to withdrawl too.
Feel the fever coming You're shaking and twitching You can scratch all over But that won't stop you itching
@Nexus7 Yep, those are symptoms/side effects of drug withdrawal, namely heroin.
Yeah, it seems like the narrator is sort of being snide towards someone- maybe someone who he's looking at from outside a situation, and telling the person they have to change what they're doing because they're ruining their life in a number of ways.
I agree with you completely, Dagny. This song is one of my favorites of theirs.
this is gonna be a classic, not their best but a GREAT song...
this song is totally about someone else's drug use and how it's affecting him "Hey you pale and sickly child You're death and living reconciled Been walking home a crooked mile" and how the person probably contracted HIV "Paying debt to karma You party for a living What you take won't kill you But careful what you're giving"
Totally agree!
I don't think so... "What you take won't kill you / But carefull what you're giving" He's not worried about this person's drug use.. it's his or her sexual... I dunno, openness? that he's concerned about.
themopo976: maybe it's a combination of the two, the drugs may lead to sexual promiscuity which could lead to the contraction of an STD, which could in turn be given to the next partner. but i do firmly believe that this song is about drug abuse, most likely heroin because of the insinuations made by the lyrics
i love the uhmmm its like sexy and bitching