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.
Radio waves are coming miles and miles
Bringing only empty boats
Whatever feeling they had when they sailed
Somehow slipped out between the notes
Out on the desert now and feeling lost
The bonnet wears a wire albatross
Monster ballads and the stations of the cross
Sighing just a little bit
Sighing just a little bit
And I was thinking about what Katy done
Thinking about what Katy did
The fairest daughter of the Pharaoh's son
Dressed in gold beneath pyramids
Out on the desert now and feeling lost
The bonnet wears a wire albatross
Monster ballads and the stations of the cross
Sighing just a little bit
Sighing just a little bit
Ones and zeroes bleeding mesa noise
And when you're empty there's so much space for them
You turn it off but then a still small voice
Comes in blazing from some vast horizon
And I was thinking about my river days
I was thinking about me and Jim
Passing Cairo on a getaway
With every steamboat like a hymn
Out on the desert now
I'm feeling lost
The bonnet wears a wire albatross
Monster ballads and the stations of the cross
Sighing just a little bit
Smiling just a little bit
Bringing only empty boats
Whatever feeling they had when they sailed
Somehow slipped out between the notes
Out on the desert now and feeling lost
The bonnet wears a wire albatross
Monster ballads and the stations of the cross
Sighing just a little bit
Sighing just a little bit
And I was thinking about what Katy done
Thinking about what Katy did
The fairest daughter of the Pharaoh's son
Dressed in gold beneath pyramids
Out on the desert now and feeling lost
The bonnet wears a wire albatross
Monster ballads and the stations of the cross
Sighing just a little bit
Sighing just a little bit
Ones and zeroes bleeding mesa noise
And when you're empty there's so much space for them
You turn it off but then a still small voice
Comes in blazing from some vast horizon
And I was thinking about my river days
I was thinking about me and Jim
Passing Cairo on a getaway
With every steamboat like a hymn
Out on the desert now
I'm feeling lost
The bonnet wears a wire albatross
Monster ballads and the stations of the cross
Sighing just a little bit
Smiling just a little bit
Lyrics submitted by EffulgentEnnui
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Light Up The Sky
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The Night We Met
Lord Huron
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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"
No Surprises
Radiohead
Radiohead
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.
Head > Heels
Ed Sheeran
Ed Sheeran
“Head > Heels” is a track that aims to capture what it feels like to experience romance that exceeds expectations. Ed Sheeran dedicates his album outro to a lover who has blessed him with a unique experience that he seeks to describe through the song’s nuanced lyrics.
Page
Ed Sheeran
Ed Sheeran
There aren’t many things that’ll hurt more than giving love a chance against your better judgement only to have your heart crushed yet again. Ed Sheeran tells such a story on “Page.” On this track, he is devastated to have lost his lover and even more saddened by the feeling that he may never move on from this.
some things i was thinking about this song:
"i was thinking about my river days, i was thinking about me and jim" probably a reference to huck finn, which fits right into the journey motif.
"ones and zeroes" the two numbers of binary code, which make up computer programming. could be josh is saying that to him the music on the radio has become reduced to some static formula that makes him empty more than moves him like music is supposed to.
"i was thinking about what katy done, i was thinking about what katy did" i bet just a cute reference to the bugs called katydids. he probably couldn't resist after writing "what katy done."
this song, as well as many others on the cd, has a ton of references to Egypt. i don't know why, just bringing it up.
this song is so lovely.
oh WOW, love this song and intend to use it with my students to illustrate the use of allusion.
i think it's about a journey, maybe literal, maybe metaphorical, and the way that when you're travelling your mind wanders--the very real spiritual nature of journeying. the stanza "ones and zeroes" has a reference to the 'still small voice' which s what the king james bible says that god is--was it isiah? god is not in the earthquake or the hurricane or the fire, but in the still small voice -- which is what he (in the song) hears when he turns off the radio (bleedng mesa noise).
stations of the cross refers to the road to golgotha when jc carried teh cross up the hill a la the passion of the christ. the wire albatross also represents jc i think--via the rime of the ancient mariner. th river days i think references huckleberry finn. anyway great song.
Katy is a slang term for the MKT (missouri-kansas-texas) railroad, which fits with the Twain ref. I think the song is about how things lose their authenticity over time. He uses music and religion as examples of things whose meaning and feeling have "slipped out between the notes."
I take this song much more litterally, which is how I tend to take a lot of Josh's music, as beautiful imagery that acctually refers to something that he experienced- So to Monster Ballads~ I think he is writing about driving through a mountinous part of the country, probably through the dessert with some heavy emotions, probably nostalgia mixed with a bit of lonliness, as he searches the radio dial for a song to listen to in which he can feel connected again to whatever it is that we all hope to be connected to when we search for the right song to match our mood on the radio as we drive... however, the radio brings him only "empty boats" that while they may have had "feeling when they sailed" ie may have been the right song at the right time, it has "somehow slipped out between the notes", so I think that the Monster Ballads are actually those loud metal ballads by bands like White Snake and Guns and Roses that sometimes dominate the airwaves in really small boarder towns... and the "Stations of the Cross" would refer to the channels on the radio that play either Christian Music or some combination of preaching and Christian Broadcasting which are also common fare when you are on the road. Neither of which seem to be hitting the spot for Josh as he is out on the dessert now, and "feeling lost" thinking about times when he was with people that he loved... I love this song.
Wow, I love this song. Admittedly, I don't quite understand all the religious imagery as I konw next to nothing about that subject, but the whole feeling of the song is inescapable. It's gorgeous.
Just one thing, infinitepet85, I always thought "I was thinking 'boug what Katy did" was a reference to the book 'What Katy Did' by Susan Coolidge. I haven't read it for ages, but Katy seems to find salvation in being a good person and in religion which would fit in with the rest of the song. I don't know - could be the bugs, but I've never heard of them since we don't have them in Australia.
I agree with infinitepet85 about the Huck Finn reference.
"And I was thinking about my river days I was thinking about me and Jim Passing Cairo on a getaway With every steamboat like a hymn"
Josh is eluding to Cairo , Illinois , which was a major Steamboat port in the 19th Century. It also is the the destination of Huck and his Slave friend Jim in the Adventures of Huck Finn , they wanted to take a Steamboat north to freedom.
I take this song much more litterally, which is how I tend to take a lot of Josh's music, as beautiful imagery that acctually refers to something that he experienced- So to Monster Ballads~ I think he is writing about driving through a mountinous part of the country, probably through the dessert with some heavy emotions, probably nostalgia mixed with a bit of lonliness, as he searches the radio dial for a song to listen to in which he can feel connected again to whatever it is that we all hope to be connected to when we search for the right song to match our mood on the radio as we drive... however, the radio brings him only "empty boats" that while they may have had "feeling when they sailed" ie may have been the right song at the right time, it has "somehow slipped out between the notes", so I think that the Monster Ballads are actually those loud metal ballads by bands like White Snake and Guns and Roses that sometimes dominate the airwaves in really small boarder towns... and the "Stations of the Cross" would refer to the channels on the radio that play either Christian Music or some combination of preaching and Christian Broadcasting which are also common fare when you are on the road. Neither of which seem to be hitting the spot for Josh as he is out on the dessert now, and "feeling lost" thinking about times when he was with people that he loved... I love this song.
This entire song (from the 1st line to the last) refers to Mark Twain's book Tom Sawyer Abroad (a 3rd sawyer/huck book) also told using the first-person narrative of Huck Finn. In the story Huck, Jim, and Tom sail across the Sahara Desert and on through Egypt in a hot air ballon (hence "the bonnet wears a wire albatross"--metophoric). One verse relates back to the book Huckleberry Finn (the best book ever!).. Which is probably where the title Monster Ballads came from (a continuation).
Great story! Give it a read. And yet another amazing song by Ritter.. Best new talant to come along since Dylan! Keep up the magic.
words cant express my feelings for this song or better yet the feelings i get from listening to this song.
the song you wish more people would hear. Great analysis in the previous posts regarding just how deep and meaningful this song is, really grows on you and is now my favorite song on the album, which is saying something. A piece of art.