Lyrics for Columbia as interpreted by jt

Columbia Lyrics
There we were, now here we are
All this confusion, nothing's the same to me
There we were, now here we are
All this confusion, nothing's the same to me

I can't tell you the way I feel
Because the way I feel is oh so new to me
I can't tell you the way I feel
Because the way I feel is oh so new to me

What I heard is not what I hear
I can see the signs but they're not very clear
What I heard is not what I hear
I can see the signs but they're not very clear

So I can't tell you the way I feel
Because the way I feel is oh so new to me
I can't tell you the way I feel
Because the way I feel is oh so new to me

This is confusion, am I confusing you?
This is confusion, am I confusing you?
This is peculiar, we don't want to fool ya
This is peculiar, we don't want to fool ya

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Aerion
10-14-2002

Rated 0 
no comments? this is one of my favorites songs by them. i love the guitar solo at the end, and liam sings the chorus really good, as well as the whole song. and the lyrics are excellent, as you can see.

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Evertonian
12-14-2004

Rated 0 
Yer, I love this song too. Great rock an' roll song. Is it true that Liam co-wrote this song?

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ElEyeZee
02-06-2005

Rated 0 
If you've got the new Definitely Maybe DVD (which I highly recommend to any Oasis fan) there's explanations from band members for each song. I like their stories for 'Columbia' best, they all seem to have the same thoughts on it: it sounded good in the studio, it's fun to play live, the groove in it is the best. With lyrics like this I like to think that only Oasis is allowed because they're the coolest and best at it as far as I'm concerned. With a song like this I'm not that troubled by strange lyrics because the music takes you away from it. And, yea, I think on the DVD they do say that Liam more than co-wrote this song.

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stoolhardy
02-09-2005

Rated 0 
I agree with ElEye that the lyrics are more there for musical effect than what they mean. I think if I were to take the lyrics literally, the song would mean, I have new feelings that I haven't felt before, I can't describe them, and I'm not sure what to think of them. Okay. Well when you can describe what you're talking about, get back to me on that...

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NoellyG
03-03-2005

Rated 0 
"This is confusion! Am I confusing you?"

Simple but great!

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bradleyb
03-10-2005

Rated 0 
Cocaine, right?

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azz11
03-10-2005

Rated 0 
this song is blatantly about columbia's finest export. and i dont mean shakira. c c c c c cocaine!!!

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salty1690
03-19-2005

Rated 0 
on the def maybe dvd it said they call it columbia cuz it was the first thing the saw, it was on a sign or something like that, its not a reference to cocaine

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stoolhardy
04-07-2005

Rated 0 
The country in South America is spelled "Colombia." This song is called "Columbia" with a U. It's something a lot of people confuse. And actually "Columbia" is another name for the USA or Lady Liberty. Or so says the dictionary. Salty's explanation makes sense, the name is just kind of random. Sort of like the song. Er, yeah.

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Eatcarpet
04-29-2005

Rated 0 
The closing bit "Yeah yeah yeah!" is fooking fantastic! And the chorus, it's just great. Did Noel or Liam sang the chorus(falsetto)?

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Xo Beyond Repair oX
06-05-2005

Rated 0 
It sounds like both Noel and Liam were singing the chorus, but I don't know which one was falsetto-ing. I'm listening to this song right now and it's just dawned on me how absolutely catchy it is. It's very Definitely Maybe aswell, you just wouldn't get a song like this on What's the story?

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Eatcarpet
06-15-2005

Rated 0 
The falsetto part is definitely Noel's voice.

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Shortdude123
07-14-2005

Rated 0 
Yeah. Ain't about cocaine. Too bad Noel didn't give Liam credit for cowriting it. :(

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bradleyb
08-11-2005

Rated 0 
It's actually a play on words. During the height of the Cool Britannia era in the early/mid 90s, there was a swanky cutting-edge club called "Columbia" where a lot of rock stars would hang out and score coke.
It IS about cocaine. The lyrics are pretty specific, and Noel has made no secret about his addictions and their influence on his songwriting (alcohol and cocaine).

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stoolhardy
12-21-2005

Rated 0 
"The lyrics are pretty specific" says bradleyb. I couldn't disagree more - these are about the most vague lyrics I've heard in a song. However the explanation of the atmosphere surrounding a club called Columbia makes sense, if indeed that's what he had in mind when he wrote the song.

The lyrics are so vague that it could be about anything though. Someone could say, "the song is about marching polar bears," and if you take that theory into the lyrics it would make sense. After all, if I was seeing a line of marching polar bears I would be "WTF?" and "What I heard is not what I hear / I can see the signs but they're not very clear" - I mean, I wouldn't be able to believe what I am seeing. "So I can't tell you the way I feel / Because the way I feel is oh so new to me" would make sense because, were I to see a line of marching polar bears, I would get a strange new feeling of utter disbelief and would try to take in the new experience. So yeah, I think it's about seeing a line of marching polar bears.

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The cage
01-05-2006

Rated 0 
I couldn't agree more with stoolhardy about this song. The lyrics are too vague. But one does not listen to this song for the lyrics - the lyrics are facile and irrelevant. It wouldn't be better off as an instrumental (according to Liam on the definitely maybe DVD, it nearly was) but the lyrics allow the song's build, and a chance for Noel to kick more ass as the song progresses. It's quite anthemic.

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musicnerd08
05-17-2006

Rated 0 
This song probably IS about drugs, given who's writing it, but I prefer to make it into a song about love.
To me, it's about a guy falling in love with a girl, who he's probably known and been friends with for a long time. "There we were, now here we are."
He feels things for her that he doesn't understand. "All this confusion, nothing's the same to me."
And he isn't sure what to do with those feelings or how to explain them. "I can't tell you the way I feel, because the way I feel is oh so new to me."
I don't know, no one else probably sees it, but it makes perfect sense to me. I actually like to interpret it this way because then it relates better to my own life. At any rate, it's an awesome song.

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vastudent
07-27-2006

Rated 0 
A fucking materpiece. The electric guitar was made for this song.

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vastudent
10-31-2006

Rated 0 
This song is massive. Words cannot describe it, you just have to listen.

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shw500
01-19-2007

Rated 0 
Not one of you has got this right! The Columbia Hotel in Bayswater is a place regularly used in the music industry to place up and coming bands when recording / gigging in London and apparently was subject to a good trashing when the lads stayed there way back in their early days. It's just a happy coincidence that it sounds similar to the country most commonly associated with charlie... the clue is in the spelling as somebody above did mention. It's got rock all to do with the Statue of Liberty for gawd's sake!!

So they trashed this hotel during a stay when they started to realise they were actually gonna make it big and I think the song was born from that moment... it must have encapsulated that feeling of "I can't believe this is actually happening... we're gonna be rock stars... what a great / new / bewildering feeling... so let's get on with doing what rock stars do and smash the granny out of the hotel!!". I'm not saying copious amounts of coke weren't involved... but when you realise what hotel they were in the penny drops.

In this respect it's quite similar to Rock'n'Roll Star, in that it's an autobiographical song written as they were making it big about just that - making it big. Which is typical of Noel writing songs that don't require him to look too far outside the band for any meaning (acquiesce being another example).

Anyway, enough pontificating, if I had to listen to only one Oasis track for the rest of my days this would be the one... I fvckn love it... love the pounding rhythm.. love the falsetto "I CAN'T TELL YOU.."... love Liam on the "come onnnn.. come onnn.. come onnn"... the chap above is right the guitar solo is maybe the best guitar on any oasis song.. and as for the final "YEA YEA YEAS" unless you strap me down when they reach that bit I'm flying around the place like that Tasmanian Devil fvcker

Oh yeah one last thing.. I was understandably disappointed when the first 2 times I saw them they didn't do Columbia... they did the 3rd time, at the City of Manchester stadium in 2005... the one fvcking time I was getting the beers in, stuck in a 30-person-long queue deep in the bowels of the stadium... hardly even heard it.... serves me right for being an alchy I guess!!

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AlfB
01-28-2007

Rated 0 
Does anyone know what's being spoken in the lead in to the vocal at the very beginning?

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vastudent
02-11-2007

Rated 0 
"unless you strap me down when they reach that bit I'm flying around the place like that Tasmanian Devil fvcker"

I know, seriously. I've hurt myself, like dug my nails into my hand.

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cable_seadreamer
10-03-2007

Rated 0 
this is obviously about oasis's rise to fame and the fact they had never felt anything like it before

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chestertouristcom
10-13-2007

Rated 0 
the melody was written by liverpool the real people

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lblake58
04-26-2008

Rated 0 
yeah i get it's about either drugs/love/rise to fame etc, but this strangely reminds me of when you're hurt/ill and someone asks what sort of feeling you have and you dont know because you've never experienced it before:

"I can't tell you the way I feel
Because the way I feel is oh so new to me"

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