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.
She drove it like she stole it
She stole it fast and with a multitude of casualties
She said I shipped it out from boulder
Packed in coffee grounds and wrapped around in dryer sheets
We spent a few months just wandering the Sonoma
High as hell and shivering and smashed
We were trying for a vision quest
We opened up three buttons
And all we saw was desert trash
It's a funny bit of chemistry
How a cool car makes a guy seem that much cooler
And it's worth noting that throughout history
Kids come around the corner to a multitude of casualties
We spent a few hours circling the city
Like a hawk out on the highways
We were looking around for something that just died
We heard the deacon's hopeful eulogy
At least in dying you don't have to deal with new wave for a second time
And after your party we got off the grid
We just couldn't get with all those clever kids
And now we forage on the frontage roads
We drive at nights I guess it just feels somewhat safer
Yeah, we scrounge around for sustenance
We mostly eat it in the back half of the theaters
We spent a few years nodding off in matinees
We were high as hell and shivering and smashed
Yeah, we were hoping for an action adventure
Something loud that we could feel through all the Feminax
And after the movie we got off the ground
Got in your car and crawled around in Lowertown
Yeah, while she was at the Citadel
He was getting high as hell
When she came to in the matinee
She was asking round for someplace else to stay
While he was down in Lowertown
She was feeling out the 5:30 folk mass
And the night she got born again
He was getting with her little hoodrat friend
They did the "Wade in The Water" into "One Tin Soldier"
She started to cry
Yeah, Youth Services always find a way
To get their bloody cross
Into your druggy little messed up teenage life
She stole it fast and with a multitude of casualties
She said I shipped it out from boulder
Packed in coffee grounds and wrapped around in dryer sheets
We spent a few months just wandering the Sonoma
High as hell and shivering and smashed
We were trying for a vision quest
We opened up three buttons
And all we saw was desert trash
It's a funny bit of chemistry
How a cool car makes a guy seem that much cooler
And it's worth noting that throughout history
Kids come around the corner to a multitude of casualties
We spent a few hours circling the city
Like a hawk out on the highways
We were looking around for something that just died
We heard the deacon's hopeful eulogy
At least in dying you don't have to deal with new wave for a second time
And after your party we got off the grid
We just couldn't get with all those clever kids
And now we forage on the frontage roads
We drive at nights I guess it just feels somewhat safer
Yeah, we scrounge around for sustenance
We mostly eat it in the back half of the theaters
We spent a few years nodding off in matinees
We were high as hell and shivering and smashed
Yeah, we were hoping for an action adventure
Something loud that we could feel through all the Feminax
And after the movie we got off the ground
Got in your car and crawled around in Lowertown
Yeah, while she was at the Citadel
He was getting high as hell
When she came to in the matinee
She was asking round for someplace else to stay
While he was down in Lowertown
She was feeling out the 5:30 folk mass
And the night she got born again
He was getting with her little hoodrat friend
They did the "Wade in The Water" into "One Tin Soldier"
She started to cry
Yeah, Youth Services always find a way
To get their bloody cross
Into your druggy little messed up teenage life
Lyrics submitted by Flapjack Finn, edited by oceansneverlisten, butterboy
Multitude of Casualties Lyrics as written by Tad Jason Kubler Craig Finn
Lyrics © Reservoir Media Management, Inc.
Lyrics powered by LyricFind
Add your thoughts
Log in now to tell us what you think this song means.
Don’t have an account? Create an account with SongMeanings to post comments, submit lyrics, and more. It’s super easy, we promise!
More Featured Meanings
Light Up The Sky
Van Halen
Van Halen
Dreamwalker
Silent Planet
Silent Planet
I think much like another song “Anti-Matter” (that's also on the same album as this song), this one is also is inspired by a horrifying van crash the band experienced on Nov 3, 2022. This, much like the other track, sounds like it's an extension what they shared while huddled in the wreckage, as they helped frontman Garrett Russell stem the bleeding from his head wound while he was under the temporary effects of a concussion. The track speaks of where the mind goes at the most desperate & desolate of times, when it just about slips away to all but disconnect itself, and the aftermath.
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.
Plastic Bag
Ed Sheeran
Ed Sheeran
“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.
"Multitude of Casualties" is the beginning of Holly's redemption and, most likely, is the counterpoint to "Your Little Hoodrat Friend." There is a hint that Holly's previous life- the suburban "good girl" who attended Mass- is something she actually wants once again. Holly makes her way back to church services while Holly's boyfriend- the narrator from "Hoodrat" and, presumably, Gideon- is shown for what he is.
This is the bridge between the early half of the record and "Crucifixion Cruise."
what is the sonoma? i mean i always assumed it was a desert, but i decided to look it up and couldn't really find anything specific.
"The Sonoma" = the sonoma valley. Gideon is NOT the narrator (the lead singer is-Craig)///Doesn't Holly = Hallelujah= the hood rat friend ("Holly was a hood rat, now you finally know that...") I think it fits, by and large. Of course, the lyrics are pretty layered so it makes things harder to unravel.
Yeah but towards the end of the song it says: And the nite that she got born again he was getting with her little hoodrat friend. And it states several times throughout the album that holly is the "hoodrat" So who is the other hoodrat the male (whom we assume is Gideon) is getting with? Cause it can't be holly, she was at the citadel getting born again..
Holly is a hoodrat and she has hoodrat friends. There's more than one of them.
"We were trying for a vision quest we opened up three buttons And all we saw was desert trash"
A reference to Cattle and the Creeping Things, Holly wears a cross that shows when she opens three buttons on her shirt. The desert trash is the cross.
There's a reference to that song in a George Pelecanos novel called Cut. He writes crime novels that take place in D.C.
I cannot believe nobody has commented on this awesome song.
Pretty simple song. Bunch of teenagers driving around the city looking for something to do.
...and yet also infinitely deeper than that.