Lyrics for Wake Up as interpreted by drinkmilk

Wake Up Lyrics
Something filled up
My heart with nothing
Someone told me not to cry

But now that I'm older
My heart's colder
And I can see that it's a lie

Children, wake up
Hold your mistake up
Before they turn the summer into dust

If the children don't grow up
Our bodies get bigger but our hearts get torn up
We're just a million little gods causing rainstorms
Turning every good thing to rust

I guess we'll just have to adjust

With my lightning bolts a-glowin'
I can't see where I am going to be
When the reaper, he reaches and touches my hand

With my lightning bolts a-glowin'
I can't see where I am going
With my lightning bolts a-glowin'
I can't see where I am going

You better look out below!

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wrat
10-18-2004

Rated 0 
All of the songs on this album are about life (and death) and this one is no exception.

Not sure exactly what he's saying but it seems that after he dies he plans to abandon his acquired civilized veneer he had to adjust to in order to grow up and return to his more primal state in the heavens.

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Idedalus
10-19-2004

Rated +4 
To me it's about lost innocence and those things you bury inside just to carry on, the things which slowly eat you up, leaving you unfeeling and cold. It's urging the innocents to be honest with themselves and confront those things which, if ignored, could leave them bottled up and emotionless. But the end of the song seems to be about the explosion of emotion that comes when the unfeeling ones come to life again.

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a town like paris
11-21-2004

Rated -1 
Who cares, it's hot.

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Gama
12-24-2004

Rated +2 
Yeah, you grow up and you see the adults around you repressing things, not talking about the things that haunt them -- and that's just wrong. It just breeds more pain.

I love the end of the song. It's like, when my hour is up, I don't want to have any leftover shit on my mind, I just want to be right there and happy with my life.

Fucking great song.

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superdam
12-26-2004

Rated +1 
I find it interesting that near the end the riff sounds a lot like Iggy Pop's "Lust For Life". My brother noticed it too.

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man on tv
01-01-2005

Rated 0 
yeah it kinda does that's weird

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zoetrope
01-23-2005

Rated 0 
I love
"our bodies get bigger but our hearts get torn up"

It's the perfect way to describe the transition between childhood and the 'real' world.

and I love how he describes death in this song.

Jeez I love this song.

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Mad Ape
02-03-2005

Rated 0 
Oh man does this song rock live. Utterly incredible. After they finished playing it, someone in the audience shouted out, "Play it again, seriously!!!" My thoughts exactly.

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Relapser
03-16-2005

Rated 0 
"Children wake up,
hold your mistake up,
before they turn the summer into dust."

Those lines just kill me... What great songwriting.

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newkicks
03-17-2005

Rated 0 
Amazing, Amazing, Amazing. AMAZING!! Great songwriting skills.

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queenscove
03-31-2005

Rated 0 
now tell me if i'm wrong but i think this song has a bit to do with the far reaching consiquences of our actions
"We're just a million little god's causin rain storms turnin' every good thing to rust."
I think that's probably my favourite line of any song, it makes me think about how i have enough power to destory anything that really matters, and probably will.

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Yoshiidino
05-04-2005

Rated 0 
"militant innocence"

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deathbear
05-11-2005

Rated 0 
I think he's saying how children are overprotected these days and are prevented from being exposed to any harm whatsoever to keep them "pure" or something. Because of this, when these kids grow up, they have to learn how to adjust to failure and hardship immediately, and that kind of sucks.

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1 Reply
Eatcarpet
06-09-2005

Rated 0 
"Somethin' filled up
my heart with nothin',
someone told me not to cry."

As a child his feelings and emotions were repressed, so he never had the chance to actually grow up emotionally. So now as an adult he feels cold and emotionless.

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jadedgypsy
10-04-2005

Rated 0 
at the end of the song, the tune gets more upbeat and happy and he shouts "you'd better look out below". i think that's a beautiful way to end the song becos if we just start to feel again instead of repressing everything, maybe we'll go to our graves with great gumption. hence "you better look out below", cos we're going down there with a fight. or something. just a thought.

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lemonaderain
10-20-2005

Rated +3 
"I thought it was 'If a body catch a body,'" I said. "Anyway, I keep picturing all these little kids playing some game in this big field of rye and all. Thousands of little kids, and nobody's around— nobody big, I mean— except me. And I'm standing on the edge of some crazy cliff. What I have to do, I have to catch everybody if they start to go over the cliff— I mean if they're running and they don't look where they're going I have to come out from somewhere and catch them. That's all I'd do all day. I'd just be the catcher in the rye and all. I know it's crazy, but that's the only thing I'd really like to be. I know it's crazy."

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2 Replies
nursejen
11-11-2005

Rated 0 
"With my lightning bolts a 'glowin I can see where I am going" --hyper-awareness of society and of your place in it and your impact on other people. Taking responsibility for your actions and their effect on others. Wake Up! Snap out of it and start feeling something! Find some meaning in your life!
...and we sure didn't learn this from the previous generation--our parents--who paved the road for and essentially allowed us to become obsessed with technology, indifference, and accumulation.

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1 Reply
ikemayusay
12-11-2005

Rated 0 
i definitely agree with queenscove and eat carpet

i feel it's about children having not letting out repressed emotions and the bottles-up feelings leaving a hollowness in their souls. The children need to wake up before it's too late and life is wasted on feeling empty inside.

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XianSnake
12-14-2005

Rated 0 
Right on the dot^

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zephyrboy64
12-21-2005

Rated 0 
I saw them play this on TV with Bowie and huge tears just rolled down my cheeks the whole time...

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I_LOVE_CAMP
12-23-2005

Rated 0 
This song has an excellent tune to it! freakin fanominal!

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bombomb
12-31-2005

Rated 0 
Just before the lights would go black and they would come on stage, U2 used this song. When the audience would first hear it, everyone would start cheering. Just about everybody in the stadium knew the chorus, and just as he would sing "You better look out below!," Bono would say something loud like "everyone" over and over, and then the whole stadium would be pitch black. A perfect song to bring out the band.

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Shanesville
01-25-2006

Rated 0 
First song I heard of Arcade FIre.Amazing guitar and the vocies fit in just right.The violin in the background is also a nice touch.

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stupid_name
01-29-2006

Rated 0 
best song on the album by far... it just surrounds you and pulls you in... such a force.

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mthowell15
02-05-2006

Rated 0 
Lemon, excelent reference to catcher in the rye. The singer comes to the same realizations about the inevitable fall of innocence and the leap for the "gold ring." If you haven't read catcher in the rye, you should.

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