| Guster – Lightning Rod Lyrics | 11 years ago |
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I first encountered this in a Doctor Who fandom wallpaper that someone made as a tribute to the Ninth Doctor (Christopher Eccleston) and I will always associate the song with that character (who we learn came back from a war psychologically scarred.) Pretty much agree with most of these interpretations. The war could be literal or metaphorical, but it is about standing up for your convictions and taking the damage that ensues. |
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| Guster – Lightning Rod Lyrics | 11 years ago |
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I first encountered this in a Doctor Who fandom wallpaper that someone made as a tribute to the Ninth Doctor (Christopher Eccleston) and I will always associate the song with that character (who we learn came back from a war psychologically scarred.) Pretty much agree with most of these interpretations. The war could be literal or metaphorical, but it is about standing up for your convictions and taking the damage that ensues. |
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| Guster – Lightning Rod Lyrics | 11 years ago |
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I first encountered this in a Doctor Who fandom wallpaper that someone made as a tribute to the Ninth Doctor (Christopher Eccleston) and I will always associate the song with that character (who we learn came back from a war psychologically scarred.) Pretty much agree with most of these interpretations. The war could be literal or metaphorical, but it is about standing up for your convictions and taking the damage that ensues. |
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| Guster – Lightning Rod Lyrics | 11 years ago |
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I first encountered this in a Doctor Who fandom wallpaper that someone made as a tribute to the Ninth Doctor (Christopher Eccleston) and I will always associate the song with that character (who we learn came back from a war psychologically scarred.) Pretty much agree with most of these interpretations. The war could be literal or metaphorical, but it is about standing up for your convictions and taking the damage that ensues. |
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| David Bowie – Ricochet Lyrics | 12 years ago |
| This song always makes me think of Loki and the mythology of Ragnarok. | |
| Oingo Boingo – Change Lyrics | 12 years ago |
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It's about the tension between stasis and change. I'm not sure either side exactly wins the argument. I love this song; it's one of my favorite Boingo tracks and probably one of my favorite songs of all time. I think it's no accident that this was late in their discography, shortly before they quit; I think it reflects on the bittersweetness of moving on to other things. There's also a definite psychedelic influence. There are at least two clips of this song performed in concert where Danny says "Okay, you all dropped [acid] already, right? Coming on now? Good..." before playing it. |
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| R.E.M. – Diminished Lyrics | 12 years ago |
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So I made a reply to the_associate but didn't realize it would be hidden by default. Synopsis is, this is obviously a metaphor for a situation in which a loved one is so easily hurt that the only way to acknowledge their feelings is to put yourself on trial and convict yourself and plead guilty for crimes you've never committed... (possibly a borderline personality disorder thing.) Another piece of evidence for that is the fact that "I'm Not Over You" is appended to this track. "I feel great I lied to save your feelings Truth convened, my head smashed through the ceiling I lost an arm, no one harmed, you diplomatically alarmed." Which is a pretty good conclusion to this song and puts it in perspective, I think. |
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| Oingo Boingo – Capitalism Lyrics | 13 years ago |
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I find this song interesting and disturbing. To get a better idea of where Danny Elfman was coming from when he wrote it, look here: http://www.boingo.org/articles/Encyclopedia.html (1989) Quote: 'For a while, he traveled outside the country, including an extended stay in Africa. While some of Oingo Boingo's early songs took aim at American institutions--"Capitalism" made sarcastic comments on the U.S. economy--he generally endorsed democratic values. He told Lawrence Henry of Music Connection:"I'm not a doomist. My attitude is always to be critical of what's around you, but not ever to forget how lucky we are. I've traveled around the world. I left thinking I was a revolutionary. I came back real right-wing patriotic. Since then, I've kind of mellowed in between. It affected me permanently and totally. "' Which I can very much sympathize with - as a staunch liberal who has walked away disgusted from more than one online forum because the people there seemed more interested in policing each other's "hardcoreness" than doing anything that might, say, lead to an actual change in society. Activism is great, but circle jerks are not activism. There's this sort of hairshirt mentality that says that aimless acts of self-denial will improve the world, and I think that this is the real target of the song. (Mind you, SOME acts of self-denial will improve the world... but it really depends on the extent to which you're consuming resources in the first place.) I remember a time when I went to a war protest, just *before* they started the second Iraq war, and found that the downtown streets had been closed off for the purpose. So we could march around and talk at each other. And that was when I realized that the U.S. Government, sometime between the nineteen-sixties and now, had found the 'solution' for the 'problem' of free speech: put it in a nice little box where nobody listens to it but the people talking. Since then I have been careful about my "talk, talk, talk". I try to spend my energy saying things where I believe they'll be heard by someone whose mind they might change, not preaching to the choir. And so I can kind of respect this song for reminding me where the pitfalls are. In short I think there are two messages here - one somewhat parodical/exaggerated, and one serious. No one with the tiniest shred of education actually believes that there's NOTHING wrong with capitalism: even super-hard-core libertarians tend to understand that the system needs some adjustment to work well. But the deeper message is a criticism of ineffectual, poorly-thought-through political styles. I think that part of it is absolutely serious - and in some ways downright sensible. |
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| Joanna Newsom – Only Skin Lyrics | 13 years ago |
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The war is in the man's head... It's clear that there's an undercurrent of loving a person who she cannot tear away from his inner self-destructive bent, whether that's depression or addiction or past trauma. And this part reads to me very much like talking down someone from a suicide attempt: "stay with me for awhile that's an awfully real gun I know life will lay you down as the lightning has lately done" --reads to me as "That gun is real, some things can't be taken back. You'll die anyway eventually, why does it have to be now?" "failing this, failing this, follow me, my sweetest friend to see what you anointed in pointing your gun there" --an acknowledgement that the stakes in this interaction have suddenly risen, that suddenly this must be taken very seriously. lay it down! nice and slow! there is nowhere to go, save up" -- and the usual exhortation that things will get better from here - followed by the story of the bird, which is an appropriate parable for the ears of a suicidal man: see, this creature fell to the brink of death, then rose up with new life in it. Not even 'don't give up' but 'I know you've given up, but it's not too late, you can still come back from the brink.' Which connects to the "follow me.... to see what you've anointed in pointing your gun there." in that the line seems to connote a change of perspective on her part. |
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| R.E.M. – Diminished Lyrics | 13 years ago |
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I agree most with the_associate's comment if any. To me this is clearly not about a real killing - rather, about the type of breakup of a friendship or romantic relationship where the other person is so easily, and genuinely, wounded that you feel responsible - like you did something terribly wrong, even when you didn't. But then, I listened to this album over and over when I was in such a situation. A friend of mine alienated everyone in our social circle; I was one of the last to be "driven off" - but she didn't do it by making them mad, rather, she was quick to take personal hurt from things people said, took it personally and held long grudges, and essentially took refuge in the friends she had left to "protect" her from people who'd done nothing wrong. The saddest part was that I really cared for her and knew that her pain was genuine, even if the cause wasn't. "Maybe I'm crazy, maybe diminished" and "I saw you fall, I think I pushed" and "I will never hurt anything" - speaks to me of the disorientation of knowing you haven't made a move to hurt someone, but being told by everyone around that you must have "pushed", must have done something. |
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