This is one of my favorite songs. https://fnfgo.io
Readying to bury your father and your mother
What did you think when you lost another?
I used to wonder why did you bother
Distanced from one, blind to the other?
Listen here, my sister and my brother
What would you care if you lost the other?
I always wonder why did we bother
Distanced from one, deaf to the other
Oh, oh, but sweetness follows
It's these little things, they can pull you under
Live your life filled with joy and wonder
I always knew this altogether thunder
Was lost in our little lives
Oh, oh, but sweetness follows
Oh, oh, but sweetness follows
It's these little things, they can pull you under
Live your life filled with joy and thunder
Yeah, yeah, we were altogether
Lost in our little lives
Oh, oh, ah
Oh, oh, sweetness follows
Oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh sweetness follows
What did you think when you lost another?
I used to wonder why did you bother
Distanced from one, blind to the other?
Listen here, my sister and my brother
What would you care if you lost the other?
I always wonder why did we bother
Distanced from one, deaf to the other
Oh, oh, but sweetness follows
It's these little things, they can pull you under
Live your life filled with joy and wonder
I always knew this altogether thunder
Was lost in our little lives
Oh, oh, but sweetness follows
Oh, oh, but sweetness follows
It's these little things, they can pull you under
Live your life filled with joy and thunder
Yeah, yeah, we were altogether
Lost in our little lives
Oh, oh, ah
Oh, oh, sweetness follows
Oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh sweetness follows
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This is about bronies. They communicate by stomping.
Dreamwalker
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I think much like another song “Anti-Matter” (that's also on the same album as this song), this one is also is inspired by a horrifying van crash the band experienced on Nov 3, 2022. This, much like the other track, sounds like it's an extension what they shared while huddled in the wreckage, as they helped frontman Garrett Russell stem the bleeding from his head wound while he was under the temporary effects of a concussion. The track speaks of where the mind goes at the most desperate & desolate of times, when it just about slips away to all but disconnect itself, and the aftermath.
No Surprises
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Same ideas expressed in Fitter, Happier are expressed in this song. We're told to strive for some sort of ideal life, which includes getting a good job, being kind to everyone, finding a partner, getting married, having a couple kids, living in a quiet neighborhood in a nice big house, etc. But in Fitter, Happier the narrator(?) realizes that it's incredibly robotic to live this life. People are being used by those in power "like a pig in a cage on antibiotics"--being pacified with things like new phones and cool gadgets and houses while being sucked dry. On No Surprises, the narrator is realizing how this life is killing him slowly. In the video, his helmet is slowly filling up with water, drowning him. But he's so complacent with it. This is a good summary of the song. This boring, "perfect" life foisted upon us by some higher powers (not spiritual, but political, economic, etc. politicians and businessmen, perhaps) is not the way to live. But there is seemingly no way out but death. He'd rather die peacefully right now than live in this cage. While our lives are often shielded, we're in our own protective bubbles, or protective helmets like the one Thom wears, if we look a little harder we can see all the corruption, lies, manipulation, etc. that is going on in the world, often run by huge yet nearly invisible organizations, corporations, and 'leaders'. It's a very hopeless song because it reflects real life.
Plastic Bag
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“Plastic Bag” is a song about searching for an escape from personal problems and hoping to find it in the lively atmosphere of a Saturday night party. Ed Sheeran tells the story of his friend and the myriad of troubles he is going through. Unable to find any solutions, this friend seeks a last resort in a party and the vanity that comes with it.
“I overthink and have trouble sleepin’ / All purpose gone and don’t have a reason / And there’s no doctor to stop this bleedin’ / So I left home and jumped in the deep end,” Ed Sheeran sings in verse one. He continues by adding that this person is feeling the weight of having disappointed his father and doesn’t have any friends to rely on in this difficult moment. In the second verse, Ed sings about the role of grief in his friend’s plight and his dwindling faith in prayer. “Saturday night is givin’ me a reason to rely on the strobe lights / The lifeline of a promise in a shot glass, and I’ll take that / If you’re givin’ out love from a plastic bag,” Ed sings on the chorus, as his friend turns to new vices in hopes of feeling better.
Publisher, BITE THIS
"Sweetness Follows"
Readying to bury your father and your mother What did you think when you lost another? I used to wonder, why did you bother? Distanced from one, blind to the other
Listen here my sister and my brother What would you care if you lost the other? I always wonder, why did we bother? Distanced from one, blind to the other
Oh, but sweetness follows
It's these little things, they can pull you under Live your life filled with joy and wonder I always knew this altogether thunder Was lost in our little lives
Oh, but sweetness follows Oh, but sweetness follows
It's these little things, they can pull you under Live your life filled with joy and thunder Yeah, yeah we were altogether Lost in our little lives
Oh, but sweetness follows Oh, but sweetness follows
This song happened to me. Buried my father and my mother, and my siblings and I got closer, but it's fleeting. The sweetness that is.
A family has fallen apart, over little things, they're distant from each other. It took a funeral to realize that there's some things bigger than those petty squabbles. So after the sadness of a funeral, hopefully the brother & sister & remaining family can reconnect (i.e., sweetness follows the sadness). This song could not be prettier.
'Distanced from one, Blind to the other'
The relationships within familly maybe? Have good relationships while you can?
Oh, ignore naivada's rantings. He comes in here all critical of other people not living up to his standard of musical criticism excellence, and in the meantime creates a post all filled with grammar, spelling, and logical errors. Just some 14 year old kid who thinks he can teach the world what "the truth" is.
Stipe created in this song a little piece of beauty that will last hundreds of years, it is just incredible.
I will suggest a slight different interpretation than most people though. My viewpoint is as someone who has not lost either parent, but who knows it won't be long now. They are both in their eighties. And I have 5 brothers and sisters who have fought among ourselves at different times. I see "readying to bury your father and your mother", and the other lyrics about family, as meaning "what the hell are you doing being upset with your (living) parents or your siblings, how can you waste precious time like that, when soon they will be gone forever."
I think this song basically means that we can get hung up on little pointles things and let them bring us down, or we can look past those and "live a life with joy and thunder"... also its talking about how things can only get better-- how sweetness comes out of the most horrible of situations
The lyrics are deep as hell, as already pointed out. But I think the guitar "solo" in this song is actually really significant as well. It's not very structured; there really aren't any notes played. It's just a beautiful wall of sound, akin to some shoegazey stuff. I think it's an abstract representation of the emotions that the lyrics are trying to portray ... although I'm pretty sure the guitar does a better job, as much as I love Stipe's voice.
Otherwise, thank you, Naivada, for making me smile. Those types of comments piss me off, too, although my analysis of Cattle's subsequent comment suggests sarcasm ... ;)
I was reading about this song on wikipedia. There was a quote from Michael Stipe that said "I've written songs before that I thought were these incredible diatribes against organized religion, these numbing thoughts that this life doesn't matter because you're moving on to something better... 'Sweetness Follows' is the song I'm thinking of" That pretty much sums it up for me. He is saying "Live your life filled with joy and wonder/thunder" because it is ridiculous to assume that all these little things that can pull you under and the distance some of us feel from the ones we love will all be resolved somehow when we die.
Organized religion tells us some other better world awaits us when we die; hence the line sweetness follows.
That's what I get.
This song can fairly simply be summed up as no matter how dark things get, there is always a light at the end of the tunnel. It is the midpoint of Automatic for the People, and represents the point where things are starting to look their bleakest in life. But this song urges the listener to carry on, and if they do, they are awarded with the stunningly hopeful climax of "Find the River." A brilliant way to structure the 9th greatest album of all time.
The author speaks simply on sheer HYPOCRISY, hence, questions himself (or a third person):
"Why would you worry now about what you´ve just lost, since you were always apart when such things were so reachable ? At the same way, why siblings would care on each other fall, if they´ve always been kinda indifferent on eath other business during their whole little lives?"
And answers:
"Such feeling is a mask! Barely formality!! After that, everyone will go back to each own private and sweet little world... Since these "petty things" won´t get you down, go back to your unmeaning little life and be happy, until you get surrounded by people like you on your grave."