Deep Water

A journey of sound. Not too many thorough explanations for this song. Apparently Seal wrote it after reading a story about two dolphins that swam from their home waters to England. Everyone from the shore town they arrived in fell in love with the dolphins, only for them to be killed by its toxic waters a few days later.

…which is a very literal interpretation of the song's first part, but I think the second part and the chorus make its meaning a little less clear. To me, Seal is deriving the meaning of jade (as a color) from the word "jade" as a verb. Being jaded means to be worked hard or worn out. It can also mean to be depressed. But since he also refers to it as a shade ('I jade the water', or poison it [green]), he's using both of its meanings for this song.

So taken in total, I think the song begins with the story about the dolphins to represent the unintended consequences of industrial societies (like pollution over nature), punctuates with the chorus about jade to represent the miserable, over-worked lives of those who inhabit such societies, and uses the second part to illustrate the beauty of emotion, nurturing and spirituality over the coldness of materialism, judgment and rationality; which are the main components of such cultures.

He also talks about the pain of death in spite of such attributes ('all you want to do is to cry out loud, but you don't know how…'), which further reinforces my idea that he's singing about the absence of emotion in industrialist cultures. It seems as if he's telling us to stop ceaselessly driving others (and ourselves) by the clock and to take moments to pause, love, and feel instead.

So in the end, "Jade… a shade of pain and then we die" really means that the material world (including our bodies and all mundane consequences) are fleeting and that the soul is eternal.

In fewer words, the song is about the importance of love. The title ("Deep Water", which he never mentions) can mean either the ocean the dolphins came from, or represent the deep, amorphous "subjective", which is what he's advocating in favor of the level, distinct "objective", whose figurative counterpart would be "shallowness" or "flat ground".

And the final part of the song (we will find a way/the sun) shows some (but little) hope for humanity's future. Seal uses the metaphor of the sun to represent the end of an age and the coming of a new, but is less enthusiastic than he is doubtful ('maybe we'll find a way'). His mild hope and resignation for the lack of love in the world can really be felt as the song comes to an end. But then again, his jade is only a shade of pain before HE dies.

Like I said–it's a journey. Really an under-appreciated masterpiece.