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The first strike of the hammer
Made my heart beat faster
The rat-tat to remind me
That there was something behind me
You can hear them
You can hear them banging on the tin
But my love won't be saved
We'll all be staring at the wave
They told me I wasn't anything
Before the bombs started falling
I was a fee for the master
I was a walking disaster
I know you hear it coming
I know you hear the sound
I know you feel it coming
Don't let it get you down
You can hear them
You can hear them banging on the tin
But my love won't be saved
We'll all be staring at the wave
But my love won't be saved
We'll all be staring at the wave
Made my heart beat faster
The rat-tat to remind me
That there was something behind me
You can hear them
You can hear them banging on the tin
But my love won't be saved
We'll all be staring at the wave
They told me I wasn't anything
Before the bombs started falling
I was a fee for the master
I was a walking disaster
I know you hear it coming
I know you hear the sound
I know you feel it coming
Don't let it get you down
You can hear them
You can hear them banging on the tin
But my love won't be saved
We'll all be staring at the wave
But my love won't be saved
We'll all be staring at the wave
Lyrics submitted by unshockable, edited by dracopticon
Track duration: 03:46
"The Wave" as written by Christian Karlsson, Pontus Johan Winnberg, Andrew Wyatt Blakemore
Lyrics © Universal Music Publishing Group, DOWNTOWN MUSIC PUBLISHING LLC
Lyrics powered by LyricFind
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The wave could be a giant flood caused by a nuclear bomb, or just a wave of atomic destruction.
The tin that they're banging on is probably like an underground nuclear base to protect them from any disasters.
Not even "his love" is saved from the wave.
Paddling out alludes to a way that people kill themselves in a very passive manner. The only way you can kill yourself without actually taking any active part in it. The main character swims out to the ocean so far that he will be so exhausted and not be able to swim back before he drowns. He paddles out top the middle of the oceans and as he swims he hears waves crash on the shore “The rat-tat to remind me That there was something behind me” which reminds him of the life he will be leaving behind and the people that always told him he was nothing “they told me I wasn’t anything”. The few people that he actually loved and cared for will never understand why he did this and selfishly left them behind and they will never remember him for how much he loved them but only for what he did to their lives when he killed himself “But my love won’t be saved”. He’s being reminded by all these things as he swims further and further out to his death and he just keeps telling himself that nobody ever thought he would amount to anything and that instead of using his gifts god bestowed on him (“I was a thief of the master, a walking disaster”) , he squandered his life and instead his life amounted to nothing more important than a beggar’s (“ You can hear them banging on the tin”) his life mirrored the lowliness of a beggar banging on a tin for money, refusing to get up and use their talents and gifts to better themselves and give their lives meaning. As he gets pulled deeper under the water as the waves push him down, he references the last sounds he hears as bombs coming down on top of him wiping out any trace of his existence. The next stanza is when he finally accepts death and instead of crying and bartering with god somehow be spared from this fate he has chosen he accepts that he wont be saved and there’s no reason to be upset anymore “I know you feel it coming Don’t let it get you down”. He thinks about all the other people that feel the same way he does, as if their own lives mean not and they will never surmount to anything. Instead of giving the world this thought of a perfect man (paddling out video) that we all strive to be our whole lives to be he amounted to less than he dreamed as many do and he couldn’t live with himself anymore waking up to a crappy life and having drugs and alcohol as his only vice. “We’ll all be staring at the wave” he knows that he is staring down his death and he can’t control if it will kill him or not and when he will actually die from it. This references how we will all die eventually unknowing when or how.
Paddling out could also reference a drug addict ODing to a point where they will die and can’t be save and are staring death down with no way to stop it or come back.