Lyrics for Oh Comely as interpreted by PLANES

Oh Comely Lyrics
Oh comely
I will be with you when you lose your breath
Chasing the only
Meaningful memory you thought you had left
With some pretty bright and bubbly terrible scene
That was doing her thing on your chest
But, oh comely
It isn't as pretty as you'd like to guess
In your memory, you're drunk on your awe to me
It doesn't mean anything at all
Oh comely
All of your friends are all letting you blow
Bristling and ugly
Bursting with fruits falling out from the holes
Of some pretty bright and bubbly friend
You could need to say comforting things in your ear
But, oh comely
There isn't such one friend that you could find here
Standing next to me
He's only my enemy
I'll crush him with everything I own

Say what you want to say
And hang for your hollow ways
Moving your mouth to pull out all your miracles
For me

Your father made fetuses with flesh-licking ladies
While you and your mother were asleep in the trailer park
Thunderous sparks from the dark of the stadiums
The music and medicine you needed for comforting
So make all your fat, fleshy fingers to moving
And pluck all your silly strings
And bend all your notes for me
Soft, silly music is meaningful, magical
The movements were beautiful
All in your ovaries
All of them milking with green fleshy flowers
While powerful pistons were sugary sweet machines
Smelling of semen all under the garden
Was all you were needing when you still believed in me

Say what you want to say
And hang for your hollow ways
Moving your mouth to pull out all your miracles
For me

I know they buried her body with others
Her sister and mother and 500 families
And will she remember me 50 years later?
I wished I could save her in some sort of time machine

Know all your enemies
We know who our enemies are
Know all your enemies
We know who our enemies are

Goldaline, my dear
We will fold and freeze together
Far away from here
There is sun and spring and green forever
But now we move to feel
For ourselves inside some stranger's stomach
Place your body here
Let your skin begin to blend itself with mine

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juan_the_owl
05-22-2002

Rated 0 
Who could possibly decipher the stream of consciousness that flows from the mouth of Jeff Mangum? i have no idea what this song means, but it blows me away. it is such a powerful song in 2 movements. Jeff Mangum takes the ugly and makes it beautiful in an ugly way. there's a lot of talk of semen, death and reincarnation. but without a doubt, Neutral Milk Hotel is one of the most interesting and innovative bands I've ever heard.

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PLANES
10-05-2002

Rated 0 
ugh, this is such a terribly wonderful epic song.

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kay_says
03-09-2003

Rated -3 
While you and your mother
Were asleep in the trailer park
Thunderous sparks from the dark of the stadiums
The music and medicine you needed for comforting
So make all your fat fleshy fingers to moving
And pluck all your silly strings
And bend all your notes for me



-----------------------------------------------------

maybe its just because im obsessed with modest mouse BUT, since the bands know eachother and i think are friends, when Mangum sings about trailer parks (where lead singer isaac brock grew up) and bending notes....could they be talking about modest mouse?

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wayne_ozacrot
03-10-2003

Rated 0 
does anybody know what this song is about? it seems the part with "i know they buried her body with others... know all your enemies" seems to be a reference to anne frank again. but then i'm not so sure how the rest of the song would work as a reference to that. it seems like the only pervasive theme through the verses is regret expressed to someone he loved, and a desire for forgiveness or a second chance.

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mrtrout
04-08-2003

Rated 0 
Mangum mentions "Goldaline" in a live version of "King of Carrot Flowers, part three,"

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mrtrout
04-08-2003

Rated 0 
I'm highly doubting that Modest Mouse has anything to do with this song. The section in question has some pretty obvious sexual references throughout, noting the word usage, etc.

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prettyscarves
04-29-2003

Rated 0 
I adore this song. It is a bit confusing though. I have theories that Jeff Mangum is talking about different people in different places in the song. I love the surrealism inherent in all of neutral milk hotels songs. This is one of the few songs where I could hear a serious lyric that included the words "time machine" and it still be beautiful and work.

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xReadysetSTAB
06-17-2003

Rated +2 
If you turn about the volume very loudly, you hear at the end of the song a man in the background yell "holy shit!"

I think that about sums it up.

This could possibly be the greatest song I have ever heard in my entire 17 years of existence, not to mention the greatest band. Jeff Mangum is pure genius.

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1 Reply
xReadysetSTAB
06-17-2003

Rated 0 
about = up

my bad.

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mrtrout
04-12-2004

Rated 0 
You sound awfully confident as to the meanings behind an album that appears to be left intentionally vague. Mangum, from what I've read, has only dropped subtle hints, not told everyone the exact meaning of each lyric. What is your secret? Also, how do the siamese twins connect to the Anne Frank theme?

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Abex22
05-09-2004

Rated 0 
i thought that the beginning of the song is the singer talking about a person he is in love with and how he will be with her when she loses her breath (sex for the first time) but the rest is just full of sex-related metaphors and wonderful lyrics which mesmerize me so i suppose i dont want to know what the song is about and so im proud of jeff mangum...hahaha modest mouse so rules

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man on tv
06-16-2004

Rated 0 
haha i was listening to this song real late at night really loud and when the guy at the end yelled holy shit it scared the crap outta me

but no nothing in this song (probably) has anything to do with modest mouse...and yes modest mouse is kicking ass and taking names

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XMorningxStarX21
09-26-2004

Rated 0 
Has anyone heard the version of this live at Jittery Joe's? If so, could anyone elaborate on what Jeff was talking about when he explained this song? I'm really dead set on finding out the meanings.. I would appreciate it if someone could email it to me or post it on here.

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no_heavy_no_good
10-23-2004

Rated 0 
After finding that most of this album has somethign to do with Anne Frank, these lines have become very powerful to me:

"And I know they buried her body with others
Her sister and mother and 500 families
And will she remember me 50 years later
I wished I could save her in some sort of time machine."

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yousaidpunksucks
10-27-2004

Rated 0 
To me this song represents humanity. Beautiful.

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Electrical_Cucumber
11-18-2004

Rated 0 
Jeff Mangum always took me to have the same relationship with his lyrics as Lou Reed. Reed, when asked what one of his songs meant, would often shrug and say, "I dunno..."

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fugazi
11-21-2004

Rated +2 
WOW. Does no one seriously get this?
I'm not claiming to absolutely know what this song is about, but here's a wild guess: a random, trashy girl has sex with a man living a shit hole of a home with his family. She's insignificant, it seems, and their reltionship is purely sex out of desperation. I imagine he's older and disgusting and she's this 'bright, bubbly thing'.

"Your father made fetuses
With flesh licking ladies
While you and your mother
Were asleep in the trailer park
Thunderous sparks from the dark of the stadiums
The music and medicine you needed for comforting
So make all your fat fleshy fingers to moving
And pluck all your silly strings
And bend all your notes for me
Soft silly music is meaningful magical
The movements were beautiful
All in your ovaries
All of them milking with green fleshy flowers
While powerful pistons were sugary sweet machines
Smelling of semen all under the garden
Was all you were needing when you still believed in me "

The relaltionship is purely sexual trash. Perhaps the relationship broke off, hence 'when yous till believed in me' - when they're having the affair. The man is probably intensely obsessed with her, his sexual energy totally focused on this young girl. He wishes he could be with her 'save her in a time machine'.

Again, she's insignificant, 'buried with...500 families'. She's trash, just a person. But their primal, sexual connection left them together.

The Goldaline lines seem to be about Siamese twins, but perhaps his infatuation with her is maternal as well. It's almost Freud-like, a sexual, phallic obsession. The semen, the ovaries. It's so primal and natural. Impregnation, being a twin (being together forever [Siamese]), an affair in a bored marriage, obsession, a revival of youthful sexual hormones, 'know who your enemies are' (she has moved on from their affair). etc. more later.

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eeekkgirl
12-13-2004

Rated 0 
no no Anne Frank has a bigger part in this song then what you just said. Listen to the Live album and you shall see...he even admits to it.

How insane and ingenious must one person be to be completely in love and obessed with someone like Anne Frank? I find it oddly interesting

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klsots
12-14-2004

Rated 0 
holland, 1945:
an entire song dedicated to anne
and other things,
in his little indirect ways.

oh, jeff, my boy,
so many references;
you and david foster wallace should be friends.

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1 Reply
float on OK?
01-03-2005

Rated 0 
i think this about the holocaust maybe?

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jacky4290
02-15-2005

Rated 0 
i think there are different things going on here....seems like one or two verses is anne frank, the beginning verses on just a girl and a boy. i dont think its sexual trash...
i agree with klsots...there's ALOT going on here.

my fav NMH song

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skyphilis
03-21-2005

Rated 0 
you'll all understand the goldeline part better if you listen to "Oh Sister". he talks about Rose Wallace Goldeline in that song...so clearly, Goldeline wasn't just a random name. the siblings freezing together, and the Goldeline part are related.

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wingedfeetxc
03-30-2005

Rated +2 
The guy who yells "holy shit!" at the end of the song is Jeff's HS friend and Apples In Stereo frontman Robert Schnider. I was talking to his wife (also of Apples In Stereo) on a message board and she said that Robert yells "holy shit!" at the end not cause of how good the song was but because he managed to play all 8 minutes of the song without screwing up. That kinda demystifies the song a bit. I don't know if that's true but I perfer the story that he yells it cause the song is so amazing.

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the_stranger
04-07-2005

Rated 0 
"drunk on your autumn" should be changed to "drunk on your awe to me"

sort of redundant, but maybe also add the "say what you want to say..." part (chorus?) after "when you still believed in me"

um...no other input sorry.

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ringwormone
05-07-2005

Rated 0 
I think it's about some guy's mostly sexual relationship with someone. She's more important to him than he is to her, and he can't be with her for some reason so he can't protect her from other people. Maybe "your father made fetuses with flesh-licking ladies while you and your mother were asleep in the trailer park" is about the guy and the girl and the guy's family. The guy talking to his kid. Or about the girl's childhood, explaining why she keeps sleeping with someone she doesn't care about. Or she's a prostitute he got involved with.

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