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Metaphor for a missing moment
Pull me into your perfect circle
One womb
One shape
One resolve
Liberate this will
To release us all
Gotta cut away, clear away
Snip away and sever this
Umbilical residue that's
Keeping me from killing you
And from pulling you down with me in here
I can almost hear you scream
Give me
One more medicated peaceful moment
One more medicated peaceful moment
And I don't wanna feel this overwhelming
Hostility
Because I don't wanna feel this overwhelming
Hostility
Gotta cut away Clear away
Snip away and sever this
Umbilical residue
Gotta cut away Clear away
Snip away and sever this
Umbilical residue that's
Keeping me from killing you
Keeping me from killing you
Pull me into your perfect circle
One womb
One shape
One resolve
Liberate this will
To release us all
Gotta cut away, clear away
Snip away and sever this
Umbilical residue that's
Keeping me from killing you
And from pulling you down with me in here
I can almost hear you scream
Give me
One more medicated peaceful moment
One more medicated peaceful moment
And I don't wanna feel this overwhelming
Hostility
Because I don't wanna feel this overwhelming
Hostility
Gotta cut away Clear away
Snip away and sever this
Umbilical residue
Gotta cut away Clear away
Snip away and sever this
Umbilical residue that's
Keeping me from killing you
Keeping me from killing you
Lyrics submitted by Demau Senae
Track duration: 04:48
"Orestes" as written by Maynard James/howerdel Keenan
Lyrics © EMI Music Publishing
Lyrics powered by LyricFind
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this is about going insane. when you first start to realize your perceptions are unlike others, and you are completely different from the "norm" of the civilization your living in, you start cutting your ties (aka life line). then because the trend for "shrinks" to prescribe strong perception altering medications, when you go to get help your only getting drugs. this only gives you small amounts of time of peaceful ( altered perceptions) moments. by the end you have cut all your social ties and become socially dead ( cutting the cord to keep you from dragging people with you ). so this becomes and obsession while you have enough to realize that your not really crazy or insane, its just your perceptions are different. in America and other "westernized" civilizations if you do not look act perform even think like the other members of your civilization, you are deemed (by people with out the proper schooling to make these judgments of value) as mentally ill, or crazy. then it is a downward spiral of social segregation. they perceive the victim as a monster, and so to the other this person is capable of anything. in short the mythos of the victim shadows the fact.
(personal)
i have a avg 150ish ( depending on the test ) I.Q. i have fun calculating moles and time differentials (T=To/(sqrt 1- (v^2/c^2)) i don't watch tv i read books and journals from the web. when i got out of high school i was forced by my family to go to the "funny farm." for saying things like time is not an non-spatial continuum (exc. min sec days) time is an location. my family thought i was insane when i was just talking about physics. only problem when i tried to explain it to them they could not understand, so it was me i was crazy to them. for years i was striped of my rights by the courts and heavily medicated. never once was i violent, but because they perceived me as a threat i was.
finally i was released and allowed to continue my life. but damage done. now i go to college so i can get my phd in physics and nuc. chem.. but i don't socialize because no one understands what im talking about except for my Dr. in my field of study. now i see it all starting again. they are now forcing me to take a lot of psyc. these teachers are giving me the same test that was given to me before i was striped of my rights.
so i cut all my ties with friends and love ones simply to not drag them though this process. some times people project on to you what they fear the most.
that is how i got this meaning from this song.
because this process is social murder,
and being the victim of it makes you very angry,
but you cant show it or they use it to label you,
and the only peace you will find is when they medicate you and lock you up,
"...keeping me from killing you, and dragging you down with me, i can almost hear you scream..."
"... give me one more medicated peaceful moment..."
and all psychiatry is...
is philosophy with pills..
maybe one day they will get there heads out of there collective (beeps).
but until then head thumpers for the most part just project there own problems on to the victim.
hate on this if you want i don't care
because at the end of the day
its all about how you relate to it and feel about it
that dictates weather or not you like or dislike it.
that is if you think for your self. but alas most people don't......
[]11[]
I agree with everyone that the song has a double meaning, in the sense that it is both about the mythological story of Orestes and also about an individual who's suffering from a relationship, for whatever reason. In my own light, this song connects with me because of a friendship or relationship that was doomed from the beginning. In my case, it's because I have abandonment issues and because the other person is just too unreliable and was only in it for the moment.
"Metaphor for a missing moment / Pull me in to your perfect circle"
- You get swept up in a good moment, finding a new friend or a lover, and before you know it, you're circling each other, orbiting around what connected you both the most and celebrating this newfound bond.
"One womb, one shape, one resolve"
- If memory serves me right, the lyrics are "one shame" and not "one shape". Either way, this is where you start to feel slightly dependent on this other person, only realizing that bond is starting to get detrimental and that you're questioning if the other person really even likes you or if they're already over you, but you can never tell. As far as you know, you're just a blip on their radar.
"Liberate this will to release us all"
- You realize that maybe this friendship wasn't a good idea and as enjoyable as it was for the moment, you're better off just walking away while you still have the will to do so.
"Got to cut away / Clear away/ Snip away and sever this umbilical residue/ That's keeping me from killing you"
- Your own delusions and negative thoughts are causing you to have resentment towards this person, and it's erasing any good feelings you may have ever had for them, so you just want to break it off so you can diminish these negative thoughts.
"And from pulling you down with me here/ I can almost hear you scream"
- By staying with this person as friends, you'll only drag them down into your own dark cloud, and it would only cause the other person to hate you for it.
"Give me one more medicated peaceful moment"
- You still want to communicate with this person so badly, because in spite of your negativity, you still had a connection with this person, and it would be a shame to throw it all away, but you know you have to. So you try to communicate with them one last time to see if they even like you still and if there's anything you can salvage from the relationship.
"And I don't want to feel this overwhelming hostility"
- Because either this person is starting to get tired of you or doesn't want to be seen around you for your negativity, or because they just don't feel the same way about you the way you feel about them, your negative feelings grow and start eating away at you, and now you realize the only cure is to just leave this person alone and go on with your life before you destroy yourself over it.
I believe this song relates to the mythology of Orestes because he has to avenge his father, but he is still killing his mother, who is always God in the eyes of all children. He doesn't want to kill her, but he also doesn't want to spend the rest of his life hating her for what she did (or let happen depending on the story). So this song relates to the myth because it's in a way describing how torn Orestes was about coming to the resolution that he had to kill his mother.
Either way, the "core" meaning of this song is about effectively ending a relationship because of resentment or anger towards the other person, and it's those feelings that are destroying you, not them, and the song is also about that realization. Either by just simply walking away or literally killing someone, you are breaking a dependent bond to save both sides.
While I know this is not really what the song is about, it amused me and I still can't get the song out of my head.
Hence, "give me one more medicated peaceful moment."
Its so Gdm beautiful i love this band
It is a very powerful and emotional song and when the lyrics are read along with the song it makes for an emotional cocktail. I know how Maynard feels since I had to cut that bond and let my mother go peacefully last winter
But here's my personal interpretation. The song is about the narrator's family. He feels resentment towards his family for pain they've caused him in his life, but because they're blood relatives, he feels tied to them ("umbilical residue"). He can't bring himself to "kill" them, which in a figurative sense means forgetting about them and moving on with his life. Something keeps bringing him back to them, even when they're not good for him, even when they hurt him.
"Give me one more medicated peaceful moment" refers to how the narrator takes antidepressants to help him deal with his issues, but they also keep him from actually facing his emotions. Basically, the narrator is stuck in his dilemma and resents his family for keeping him from escaping from it.
Maynard's and Billy's voices complement each other perfectly in this song, and it has a beautiful, sad atmosphere. Definitely one of the best!