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"
All the things we never know we need
Looks like we get them in the end
Measure time in leisure time and greed
And by the time we get to spend
A floating bed
A head of stone
A home plugged into every phone
Kimono coral floral print
Exclusive tint and cut reclusive
No it doesn't come for free
But it's the price
We pay for happiness
No don't talk about more to life than this
Dream a world maybe no one owns
No don't think about all the life we miss
Swallow doubt as the hunger grows
Make believe its like no one knows
Even if we turn more to most
We'll never satisfy the hungry ghost
All the stuff we know we never want
Seems like we get it anyway
Safe to say it isn't really wrong
Not when we know we only
Throw it all away
Yeah all of this we never know we want
Its like we get it anyway
Safe to say it isn't ever wrong
Better to get than to delay
A 3d screen
A cleaner fit
A bit pulled out of every hit
Addicted latest greatest piece
Design caprice and make the headline
No it doesn't come for free
But it's the price
We pay for happiness
No don't talk about more to life than this
Dream a world maybe no one owns
No don't think about all the life we miss
Swallow doubt as the hunger grows
Make believe its like no one knows
Even if we turn more to most
We'll never satisfy the hungry ghost
And all of this
We know we never need
Well it's the price
We pay for happiness
Looks like we get them in the end
Measure time in leisure time and greed
And by the time we get to spend
A floating bed
A head of stone
A home plugged into every phone
Kimono coral floral print
Exclusive tint and cut reclusive
No it doesn't come for free
But it's the price
We pay for happiness
No don't talk about more to life than this
Dream a world maybe no one owns
No don't think about all the life we miss
Swallow doubt as the hunger grows
Make believe its like no one knows
Even if we turn more to most
We'll never satisfy the hungry ghost
All the stuff we know we never want
Seems like we get it anyway
Safe to say it isn't really wrong
Not when we know we only
Throw it all away
Yeah all of this we never know we want
Its like we get it anyway
Safe to say it isn't ever wrong
Better to get than to delay
A 3d screen
A cleaner fit
A bit pulled out of every hit
Addicted latest greatest piece
Design caprice and make the headline
No it doesn't come for free
But it's the price
We pay for happiness
No don't talk about more to life than this
Dream a world maybe no one owns
No don't think about all the life we miss
Swallow doubt as the hunger grows
Make believe its like no one knows
Even if we turn more to most
We'll never satisfy the hungry ghost
And all of this
We know we never need
Well it's the price
We pay for happiness
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The Night We Met
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This song was originally written by a guy called Peter Gutteridge. He was one of the founders of the "Dunedin Sound" a musical scene in the south of New Zealand in the early 80s. From there it was covered by "The Clean" one of the early bands of that scene (he had originally been a member of in it's early days, writing a couple of their best early songs). The Dunedin sound, and the Clean became popular on american college radio in the mid to late 80s. I guess Yo La Tengo heard that version.
Great version of a great song,
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I love this one. So cynical...and so true. The "hungry ghost" is of course greed, desire for fame, etc.
I especially love the line "A home plugged into every home." Totally reminds me of how all those people in the States were using subprime rates to buy second homes they would never ever ever be able to pay off. (Indeed, I seem to recall that ugly episode was right around the time this album was released!)
One other thing...the lines from the refrain: No, don't talk about more to life than this, Dream a world maybe no-one owns remind me so much of a particular verse of John Lennon's "Imagine:" Imagine no possessions I wonder if you can No need for greed or hunger A brotherhood of man Imagine all the people Sharing all the world...