Use your intuition
It's all you've got
Keys are revving
There's a dozen locks
Standing your way
So goes the gold age
To your entire life

Digging for a way
You cast a spell
Grab a path from all the things they sell
But they don't let go
Just touch your shin bone
Keep them away

I know what I know
But nothing will fill the hole
So let your mind go (Let my mind go)
Straight down the runway
Does one want to
Get more used to?
The mall and misery (The mall and the misery)
The dead mouths it costs to be alive

Oh she lies half burning
From the batting crows
You're falling like a lamb
What you've never been told
There's a new world
Somewhere a good girl
Lives and breathes

Part of her opened the callow mind
Audio has stolen the morning tide
There's a dark time
This is a dark life
Feel your heart

I know what I know
But nothing will fill the hole
So let your mind go (Let my mind go)
Straight down the runway
Does one want to
Get more used to?
The mall and misery (The mall and the misery)
The dead mouths it costs to be alive



Lyrics submitted by Konversekid

Track duration: 04:07

"The Mall and Misery" as written by James Mercer Brian Joseph Burton

Lyrics © CHRYSALIS MUSIC GROUP

Lyrics powered by LyricFind


The Mall and the Misery song meanings
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15 Comments

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  • +1
    General Comment:"Oh she lies half burning From the biting cold If only to learn What you've never been told
    There's a real world Somewhere a good girl Lives and breathes"

    ima take a guess at the meaning and mention that cheap labor bordering on slavery still seems to be a booming business. cell phones, shirts and shoes, laptops with springy keys and mp3 players streaming the tunes of broken bells ...most of it is made in a foreign country by workers who get paid teeny tiny wages. most of it is made by hungry people with hungry mouths - people who can't afford heat. even the fork i use to eat was likely made by a hungry person...that's the real world, and that's what you're never told when the goods are sold...

    maybe we call retail outlets "chain stores" for a reason...

    i might be completely off with my interpretation, but for me, it seems to fit...
    Flag dd31415on August 29, 2011   Link
  • +1
    General Comment:Its strange that everyone is hearing "the dead mouths it costs to be alive". I've always heard "the debt mounts, it costs to be alive"...which makes more sense when you think about it. Have another listen, I think you'll find I'm right.

    Great song, that to me is about the consumerism that's taken over our country:

    "keys are rare and there's a dozen locks standing in your way"-no matter how you may wish to not buy into it; we're hit from all sides by the message to buy, buy, buy...

    "so goes the golden age of your entire life"-you can waste the best years of your life feeling less than others because of all the things you don't have...

    "digging for a way, you cast a spell
    carve a path from all the things they sell, but they don't let go"-It takes some serious effort to extricate yourself from the traps all these multi-billion dollar corporations lay for you, to keep you always wanting more...

    "I know what I know, would not fill a thimble"-he's cautioning us that he knows nothing, therefore can't tell us what to do; that to really be free you have to "let your mind go, straight down the runway", let your mind take flight...

    "does one want to get more used to, the mall and misery, the debt mounts, it costs to be alive"-do we really want our lives to be spent acquiring crap at the mall? It only brings misery in the end. Our debt mounts and mounts...

    And so on. I don't have time right now to go through the whole song, but this is what I've always gotten from it. Great lyrics, beautiful melody and vocals...bravo Broken Bells.
    Flag thewrytruthon July 12, 2011   Link
  • 0
    General Comment:not sure what the song is supposed to mean exactly

    but playing music at the mall

    I can really dig this song
    Love the title
    Flag michaelcovelon December 11, 2010   Link
  • 0
    General Comment:TommyCreedboi is dead on. Do we really WANT to be "used to the mall and misery"? Probably not.
    I think a lot of people are caught in between doing all the things a person has to do in our society to survive "comfortably" and being themselves in their natural forms. We get caught between those two routes at a relatively young age...possibly an age when we should really be using who we ARE to add something the world...or just to not be miserable.
    There are more forces pulling people toward doing what they have to do in the conventional world than not and that's why this song exists, I think. They ARE telling people to not mute their intuitions for any reason, because so many things drown out the thoughts of individual people.
    Flag dandelion1on September 12, 2010   Link
  • +2
    General Comment:It is always amazing to come on here and read the many different meanings people come up with. To me this is the beautiful thing about music, as many can take what they will from it, and it touches them all differently. My interpretation of this song: I believe it is basically about the world as it is today. The people in control feed consumerism to the masses. We are born and bred to buy buy buy. We are walking atm machines for these people. I think this is a defiant statement against that way of life. It is misery when your worth is measured with what you acquire at the mall. Dead mouths it costs to be alive I think is a reference to the debt each one of us will acquire over the course of our lives. It is impossible to escape with the current system. It is designed this way. Remember what it was like to feel? Think about that. When accosted by debt and force fed fear and paranoia to be kept at bay, while 1 percent of the population spends our wealth on 13 houses which never get lived in except for two months a year. Not trying to get too political, but considering Danger Mouse current situation with his record company(google it) and the fact this album leaked without even really allowing the single to get airplay leads me to believe that this is the meaning behind this song. It does cost to be alive. Should it? Where did the romance go? Where did feelings go? I don't like to feel like I'm doomed before I even got started. This is an amazing song, and to me it is a defiant statement against the way things are and possibly an attempt to get people to think. Does one really want to get more used to the mall and the misery. Thank you Broken Bells. Peace
    Flag TommyCreedboion April 10, 2010   Link
  • 0
    General Comment:I love the transition between tracks from Mongrel Heart.

    Does anyone think that The Mall has anything to do with this line from Nothing at All?

    "You got a feeling nothing here is free,
    'Cause you grew up in a mall."
    Flag jenifuhron April 10, 2010   Link
  • 0
    General Comment:It's 'If only to learn what you've never been told'
    Flag yazelis13on March 30, 2010   Link
  • 0
    General Comment:PS : This song is "The Mall And the Misery" not "October" according to the tracks previewed on Pitckfork.

    pitchfork.com/reviews/albums/13979-broken-bells/
    Flag Cyberghoston March 30, 2010   Link
  • 0
    General Comment:Luckyguess had a good interpretation of this, I just viewed a few things differently :

    "The dead mouths it costs to be alive" I think he's saying that while you're here alive there are millions that are dying and they could probably do a better job at living your life than you are now. Also "powder hope' could mean drugs, her young mind turns to drugs for hope while the world around "the morning tide" washes her ideas away in this dark time when true genius is ignore and pandering puppets rise to fame.


    Oh she lies half burning
    From the biting cold
    You're falling a lamb
    What you've never been told
    There's a real world
    Somewhere a good girl
    Lives and breathes

    This verse confuses me a bit, could he be talking about a different side of her?
    "lamb" I think is a reference to innocence rather than stupidity.
    Flag Cyberghoston March 30, 2010   Link
  • 0
    General Comment:the chorus is "I know what I know, wouldn't fill a thimble, so let your mind go"
    Flag ShuntripJoshon March 25, 2010   Link

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