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Family Tree Lyrics
Anda my love
Wake up to your window The day calls in billows It�s echoing moonlight onto the blue nightmare of your heart In cosy red rainbow It�s shaking off halos And the memory of our sacred so and so Oh take my hand sweet Complete your release unbury your feet And married we'll be Alone in receiving ours is a feeling not that they would see They don�t know that we could be Down where your cradle escaped the sea And your raven haired Mama cought told you so's Were hanging in the shadow of your family tree Your haunted heart and me Brought down by an old idea whose time has come And in the shadow of the gallows of your family tree There's a hundred hearts or three Pumping blood to the roots of evil to keep them young Ah me all mine Is it safe to say that we�ve waited patiently Call me on time And recall the tune that has place us gracefully All into line There's the garden grave and a place they've saved for you I'll fall by your side Though your silver haired Mama throws told you so's Were laying in the shadow of your family tree Your haunted heart and me Brought down by an old idea whose time has come And in the shadow of the gallows of your family tree There's a hundred hearts or three Pumping blood to the roots of evil to keep it young And now we�ll gather in the shadow of your family tree In haunted harmony Brought down by an old idea whose time has come And in the shadow of the valley of your family tree There's a hundred hearts or three Pumping blood to the roots of evil to keep us young |
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08-29-2009
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08-11-2009
AVC: "Family Tree" seems particularly poignant. What inspired that song?
TA: I've been in situations, and known people in situations, where someone's pure affection was unfortunately affected by outside sources. The terrain of a person's heart really isn't under the jurisdiction of anybody but that person, and in that song, it's an older generation condemning a relationship between two people for reasons that they probably had to deal with when they were younger. Like, "Well, when I was your age, I fell in love with so-and-so, and that was nothing but hell for me…" The "old idea" in the lyrics is bigotry, which could relate to race, to gender, to sexuality… People have their reasons for doing that, but it makes for such a waste of what could be a really short life.
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06-30-2009
08-11-2009
AVC: "Family Tree" seems particularly poignant. What inspired that song?
TA: I've been in situations, and known people in situations, where someone's pure affection was unfortunately affected by outside sources. The terrain of a person's heart really isn't under the jurisdiction of anybody but that person, and in that song, it's an older generation condemning a relationship between two people for reasons that they probably had to deal with when they were younger. Like, "Well, when I was your age, I fell in love with so-and-so, and that was nothing but hell for me…" The "old idea" in the lyrics is bigotry, which could relate to race, to gender, to sexuality… People have their reasons for doing that, but it makes for such a waste of what could be a really short life.
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06-08-2009
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06-02-2009
And i am crying, it is so achingly beautiful. It hit me.
And you can't fully get it without having a personal and family history of pain, trauma. How the stories repeat themselves generation after generation, because parenting style, is product of what the parent experienced as a child neglect, violence or abuse. This song for me is about, healing how when you find a person who can understand your personal history, and when one can face and overcome, escape the circle of pain. It is about And the search for a place, for a house on a mountain filled with light. A safe place of love. Like the cycle stops with us, we will not pass this to our children, and won't nurture the seeds of evil. Because your upbringing might not have prepared you for a fulfilling loving life. And it is a struggle to get there.
This Reminds me of the end of "The Outliers, A history of success" By Malcom Gladwell Novel: In the end he writes about Living in the beautiful house on the mountain.
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12-26-2008
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12-24-2008
AVC: "Family Tree" seems particularly poignant. What inspired that song?
TA: I've been in situations, and known people in situations, where someone's pure affection was unfortunately affected by outside sources. The terrain of a person's heart really isn't under the jurisdiction of anybody but that person, and in that song, it's an older generation condemning a relationship between two people for reasons that they probably had to deal with when they were younger. Like, "Well, when I was your age, I fell in love with so-and-so, and that was nothing but hell for me…" The "old idea" in the lyrics is bigotry, which could relate to race, to gender, to sexuality… People have their reasons for doing that, but it makes for such a waste of what could be a really short life.
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12-23-2008
i kinda see it as a different style of love song with great poetic imagery of the beauty of his love, "echoing moonlight/cosy red rainbows/shaking off halos" and then how the beauty "shakes off" the memory of past loves, "sacred so and so's".
then comes in the forbidden aspect when Tunde says, "alone and receiving, ours is a feeling, not that they would see, they don't know that we could be, down where your cradle escaped the sea, and where your raven haired mama caught told you so's" kind of describes the feeling of young lovers and the pressure given by everyone around them.
next comes to chorus which puts a different spin on marriage, lyrically, by describing it as, "hanging in the shadow of your family tree" and then the "old idea whose time has come" referring to marriage.
the rest is just reoccurring elements that only continue on my current assessment...
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11-24-2008
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11-20-2008
And your raven haired Mama cought told you so's
&
Though your silver haired Mama throws told you so's
are refering to the mother of one of the characters before and after some break up or tragedy in the relationship. She basically giving them an "i told you so". When she first says it she's younger so her hair is completely black then later it's silver with age and the evil she originally predicted for them and warned them of came to pass. I hate to believe its just forbidden love but I guess it is. I feel like it's about some greek tragedy of a story where they were doomed from the beginning but they went for it any way, and eventually fate caught up with them. I think the line tragicweek pointed out was really interesting and makes a lot of sense. Also, I think the idea of their bodies fertilizing the tree so it lives on a as a reminder of the evil/tragedy that they were made victims to. No matter what is all means though, it's a beautiful song.
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11-15-2008
perhaps it's just my being overdramatic, but this is how i see it. and i can see the love being a female as well (or perhaps both male), but i chose making them a heterosexual couple above, because that may be more likely.
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10-15-2008
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10-10-2008
Literal tree-gallows hanging
Family tree in the obvious generational sense
The Human Family-hence the biblical allusion and the suggestion of original sin.
On one level a lament for people who have been victims of racism in a final sense but on another level a question of whether that evil will continue to be nourished in America.
A beautiful song but also a political one. America is on the cusp of electing a black President. They shouldn't forget their past.
Will the evil at the roots of the American family tree continue to flourish? Lets hope not-America has an opportunity for a new beginning out of the present carnage.
A Scottish fan and observer.
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10-09-2008
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10-06-2008
Literally the song makes me imagine the scene with Aron and Abra beneath the willow tree.
On a more abstract level it makes me think about the Fall of Man (is that capitalized?) and how the protagonist in the song is haunted by the evil in the roots of his family tree.
This probably doesn't make much sense but that's what I like about music - A song can have a profound meaning for the listener that is completely unintended by the musician.
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10-06-2008
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10-05-2008
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10-05-2008
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09-28-2008
'Were hanging in the shadow of your family tree
Your haunted heart and me
Brought down by an old idea whose time has come'
They got hanged
'Were laying in the shadow of your family tree
Your haunted heart and me
Brought down by an old idea whose time has come'
Being prepared for burial
'And now we’ll gather in the shadow of your family tree
In haunted harmony
Brought down by an old idea whose time has come'
Then being buried.
'And in the shadow of the valley of your family tree' is an allusion to Psalms 23, "though I may walk through the shadow of the valley of death," a line that is used as a symbol of God's protection from evil, but in this case alludes to the Family Tree as death.
With that in mind this song becomes less about the couple and more about the Family Tree, which could be interpreted literally to mean that they were hanged from tree that the family has lived around for decades and then were buried at it's roots to become one of the hundred bodies buried under the tree that have become a fertilizer for the tree that will keep the Tree healthy and make sure it can still be used to hang couples from and "keep them young"
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09-26-2008
02-18-2009
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09-25-2008
It reminds me of some forbidden kind of civil war era love, or something that relates to that; trees were often used as a gallows I believe. That and the fact that 4/5 of the band are black leads me to believe it has to do with those times. Maybe between a black slave and a white woman, or maybe the "you" in the song has some sort of civil war history among their ancestry that prevents the two from being together... something along those lines.
In any case, the song is terribly sad and beautiful.
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09-24-2008
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09-24-2008
I'm addicted to this song and your thoughts on the story are interesting. Think I’ll keep listening for now and see if anything pops into my head.
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09-24-2008
This song is about a forbidden love due to some sort of belief of one of the families. I can't figure out exactly what it is but the word sacred means referring to religion, as well as shaking off halos, so they are defiantly ignoring some religious belief of one of their families. So verse 1, their love is beating out religious ideas.
I suppose a gay relationship is the first thing to come to mind due to the religion part, but i'm not sure thats right. The family tree part makes it seem like something passed down over generations, which feels like racism, but i really can't say for sure.
Verse 2, is about getting away from the family and moving away on their own and getting married. Also, at time of writing there aren't official lyrics up, and i can't make out the last line of the song, but the part about the cradle escaping the sea and the mother could refer to a similar relationship by the mother the resulted in an unwanted child, the person being sung about in this song. The words raven haired can be made out though, and this is used later to show the passage of time.
The chorus changes slightly each time they go back to it and it has important meaning. This time they are stuck in the family tree's shadow. All these people from the past are keeping the evil tradition going.
The next verse is the end of their relationship. Its strange because i don't know why or what causes it, but years later they decide to go back home to this family. The family hasn't changed their beliefs and while they still have a spot there for their child the lover (the singer of the song) is killed.
Also, again with no official lyrics, but if these are right, earlier the mother caught told you so's from a similar relationship, and now at the end of this verse she is throwing them. So the mother tried to escape the old beliefs of her family, only to go back to one of them. This is referenced at the same time the child of the mother is doing the same thing, going back to the family.
The chorus repeats this time but changes the next, where the singer of the song has become one of the "hundred hearts" in the shadow of the family tree. And the cycle repeats.....
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09-23-2008
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