To me the big question is: who is "you" in this song.
I'd offer: the "you" is the singer himself -- more specifically, the child or innocent good person inside himself. And he's searching for that innocent, good child and trying to reconnect. He's done so many bad things and reached such a state of shame, guilt, and anger, that he feels like he's lost that person and needs to find him again. He doesn't know how, it's like moving without motion.
A "shadowplay" a reference to Plato's shadow world. All we can do is act out our own death... we know no more, just like Plato's shadow people.
The room without a window in the corner may be a counselor's or psychiatrist's office where he finally faced this question.
The assassins are then his own self destructive thoughts and actions, he feels like they're just grouped on the floor and dancing as if to mock his ability to control them. But when they make a move to connect, i.e. carry out their threats, an amazing thing happens... nothing happens and nobody cares... "I could only stare in disbelief as the crowds all left". This is usual in therapy, you find out that the demons you think you have aren't real.
The final lines "I did everything I wanted to.. I let them use you..." are then the singer lamenting that he let the good innocent child at his core be kicked around by others, and he participated willingly.
Quite. It a a classic picture of the tortured artist. The artist who lets himself become vulnerable and naked for the sake of art. That is why I admire people like Ian Curtis, Nick Drake, Leonard Cohen, etc. Because they completely exposed themselves and thus were able to create some of the most beautiful, sad, melancholic, and powerful (and revealing) music of all time (something that I would never have the courage to do).
Quite. It a a classic picture of the tortured artist. The artist who lets himself become vulnerable and naked for the sake of art. That is why I admire people like Ian Curtis, Nick Drake, Leonard Cohen, etc. Because they completely exposed themselves and thus were able to create some of the most beautiful, sad, melancholic, and powerful (and revealing) music of all time (something that I would never have the courage to do).
To me the big question is: who is "you" in this song.
I'd offer: the "you" is the singer himself -- more specifically, the child or innocent good person inside himself. And he's searching for that innocent, good child and trying to reconnect. He's done so many bad things and reached such a state of shame, guilt, and anger, that he feels like he's lost that person and needs to find him again. He doesn't know how, it's like moving without motion.
A "shadowplay" a reference to Plato's shadow world. All we can do is act out our own death... we know no more, just like Plato's shadow people.
The room without a window in the corner may be a counselor's or psychiatrist's office where he finally faced this question.
The assassins are then his own self destructive thoughts and actions, he feels like they're just grouped on the floor and dancing as if to mock his ability to control them. But when they make a move to connect, i.e. carry out their threats, an amazing thing happens... nothing happens and nobody cares... "I could only stare in disbelief as the crowds all left". This is usual in therapy, you find out that the demons you think you have aren't real.
The final lines "I did everything I wanted to.. I let them use you..." are then the singer lamenting that he let the good innocent child at his core be kicked around by others, and he participated willingly.
Quite. It a a classic picture of the tortured artist. The artist who lets himself become vulnerable and naked for the sake of art. That is why I admire people like Ian Curtis, Nick Drake, Leonard Cohen, etc. Because they completely exposed themselves and thus were able to create some of the most beautiful, sad, melancholic, and powerful (and revealing) music of all time (something that I would never have the courage to do).
Quite. It a a classic picture of the tortured artist. The artist who lets himself become vulnerable and naked for the sake of art. That is why I admire people like Ian Curtis, Nick Drake, Leonard Cohen, etc. Because they completely exposed themselves and thus were able to create some of the most beautiful, sad, melancholic, and powerful (and revealing) music of all time (something that I would never have the courage to do).