Pepper

This song is about heroin. Like really really obviously about heroin. "I can taste you on my lips and smell you on my clothes cinnamon and sugary..." If you've ever been around or been a junkie you don't forget that not quite opium not quite cinnamon reek and the smell really is so sweet you can taste it. Knowing this the rest of the song is pretty easy to decipher. Junkies tend to have short ugly lives unless they stop being junkies(choose life)"Some will fall in love with life and drink it from a fountain"

I fucking got it!!!

POV of characters!!! I don't mind the sun sometimes, the images it shows (people look at the sun are dumb it blinds them, but they do it anyway) I can taste you on my lips and smell you in my clothes (sexual innuendo!!) Cinnamon and sugary and softly spoken lies (another sexual innuendo) You never know just how to look through other people's eyes (they don't know themselves so they do what they think other people think they should do themselves)

1rst verse sharon gave cherise an std the facial scar is a supremacist thing and they were killing people in texas tommy is a true story of a black boy who died by some white supremacists it was a famous story he played the piano good hit on a white woman or whistled at her and thats why he died, he was traveling at the time. he didn't break a leg (make it with his talent) he lost his leg (lost his life and talent)

this song is based on sick people seriously.

Some will die in hot pursuit in fiery auto crashes (i better slow the fuck down in my car!) Some will die in hot pursuit while sifting through my ashes (sifting through ashes may imply inheriting money) Some will fall in love with life and drink it from a fountain (live like there's no tomorrow, fountains symbolize eternity) That is pouring like an avalanche, coming down the mountain (but they will died in this so its like what's the point?)

Reckless people meet death...

So don't do heroin kids. In my town some kids are dying of heroin abuse. Seriously what a waste. Make music but don't do heroin its not fun. My friend's bro was a fucking kurt kobain and he died by drug abuse :(

Im tired of interpreting this song... blah.

This song says a lot without forcing it. I don't think this song goes out of its way to make a point or send a message, and that's part of why it is such a great song. The purpose of lyrics is to "show," rather than "tell". So what does the song do? It gives us examples of the types of characters the singer is associated with, images of life so to speak. And as for falling in love, it could be with death, or with living dangerously, which is essentially "flirting with death" if we want to personify Death. The kid who lost his leg in a train accident, for example, flirts with death. And as for the chorus:

I don't mind the sun sometimes, the images it shows I can taste you on my lips and smell you in my clothes Cinnamon and sugary and softly spoken lies You never know just how you look through other people's eyes

I think the sun, because it is essentially light, just represents him seeing the truth. He doesn't mind it for these reasons: it is cinnamon and sugary, yet juxtaposed with softly spoken lies reveals what the sun reveals: that there is a downside to everything as well. A lot of these 90's lyrics do the same thing and it's really neat. Third Eye Blind lyrics work the same way.

I think this song, like all great art has multiple interpretations that all reinforce the same basic conclusion.

I think that heroin use is a theme in the song, but it is used to demonstrate a broader point. I believe that the lines "they were all in love with dying, they were drinking from a fountain, that was pouring like an avalanche coming down the mountain" is a metaphor for all activities that people engage in to excess. Heroin, casual sex, fighting, drinking, and driving when done in a reckless manner are all enjoyable but inevitably lead to tragedy. One cannot really "drink" something like an avalanche, and here the point is made that while these people choose their actions, they cannot control the outcome or what will ultimately happen.

There are alot of good ideas like mezdispencers, and im just onna expand upon it a little. The main part of the song is about how kids enjoy that life on the edge, but it catches up to them eventially

"they were drinkin' from a fountain That was pouring like an avalanche, coming down the mountain." the water and the fountain are the things that hurt them but they still do anyway, but they eventually will ge washed away when the avalanche washes them away. the chorus is about how it's good to slow down and look at life, and the last like is saying "look at it through other people's eyes"because you have to see what you look like doing all these crazy kid things... (but he's not saying to stop, just to think about it)

This song is about being so in love with life, that you even dig the death part. It's about accepting the whole universe, with the ugliness and everything. It's about Nietzsche's "Eternal Return".

"I don't mind the sun sometimes, the images it shows / I can taste you on my lips and smell you in my clothes / Cinnamon and sugary and softly spoken lies"

The singer is ok with all of this, taking it all as part of the deal. As Dr. Hunter used to say: "Buy the ticket; take the ride." The singer describes people who have no detachment from life, who just go all in, balls to the wall. They're not self-conscious; they're not second-guessing themselves.

"They were all in love with dying, they were drinking from a fountain / That was pouring like an avalanche, coming down the mountain."

"Some will fall in love with life and drink it from a fountain / that is pouring like an avalanche, coming down the mountain."

They are in love with life. They are therefore also in love with dying, because they fully accept that to live is to be dying; as soon as we're born, we start dying. The contrast of these two lines (in love with dying/in love with life) indicates that life and dying are the SAME THING. The lack of self-consiousness explains the song's most memorable line:

"You never know just how you look through other people's eyes."

In a way, this is trivial. Of course you never know. The point is that the characters listed in this song don't CARE.

"Some will die in hot pursuit while sifting through my ashes."

Some people over-analyze life. They try to figure it out, as if from the outside, sifting through its ashes, instead of falling in love with it. They can't taste life on their lips, smell it in their clothes, because they're caught up in trying to understand it, which is detached.

Of course the song is about drugs, as many have remarked. It's the Butthole Surfers for Chrissake. Drugs can get you past the whole self-conscious analysis that keeps you from being "in love" with life and death. The drugs intensify the experience of life, and they hasten (and sometimes resemble) death. The singer knows that these people die, sometimes horribly, but he doesn't mind the images that the sun shows him. He has experienced death and life, and he is in love with it all.

I have no idea what this song is about, but this band fucking rules, the 2 albums before weird revolution are fucking rad. They have a rad original sound. rhink can suck my sac.

Ok... Well, First off, I always that the line was "They were all in love with Di, and they were drinking from a fountain..." I'm listening to it right now... that one line over and over and I can't tell... It could be either one... let's gowith the dying theory...

I hate that almost any song out there people turn into a drug reference, but I can definitely see that in this one... I've never done heroin, but from what I've heard about it, it could be described as drinking from a fountain (shooting up) that was pouring like an avalanche, coming down a mountain (The rush of heroin into your system puts you into a stupor, and each time you do it, there's the possibility of being buried under that rush and not coming out... much like an avalanche)

But moving away from the drug reference, This song is simply about being stupid... and the chorus is about coming out of that wild streak for a moment... Waking up during the day sometimes, and seeing that the world is a pretty ok place in the sunshine...

I think the taste you on my lips and smell you in my clothes line is about... Ok, Screw it... The more I think about it, the more clearly this becomes an ode to heroin...

There is no mention of any girl in this song. It is not about girls or love or living life to the fullest, it is about drugs and death.

I had thought that the reference to drinking from a fountain pouring like an avalanche etc. was a reference to drinking alcohol, but after reading what is here, it is obvious that I was wrong. The song is about heroin. The references to smell are a giveaway. I guess the reference to drinking life from a fountain, etc. must relate to people seeking the intense experience of heroin. I've never tried heroin, but I gather the experience can be very intense.

Why do so many people insist on seeing drug references in so many songs? Because a lot of artistically talented people use heroin and write songs about it. An enormous number of good songs are written about heroin b/c it is a very powerful experience and influence for a lot of musicians. Anyone who's not comfortable with that can pretend the song is about a girl or living life to the max or whatever. It will still be about heroin.

How could no one know exactly what this song means?

1. The people in the song, are the people he tastes and smells
2. As in the blood in his clothes
3. The sun shines only when somone is dying or doing something crazy
4. Technically their not in love with dying they just die anyway
5. The chorus isnt just a girl or boy, but both, as in all the people in the verses
6. "No one knows just how you look through other peoples eyes"- What other people think or see wen their dead and finnally 7. It's telling all the extremists' that they must be stupid

-This is their interview on Y 100 in 2002, in my words