fandomsecrets | [ SECRET POST #2209 ]

[ SECRET POST #2209 ]

⌈ Secret Post #2208 ⌋

Warning: Some secrets are NOT worksafe and may contain SPOILERS.

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Notes:

Secrets Left to Post: 06 pages, 121 secrets from Secret Submission Post #316.
Secrets Not Posted: [ 0 - broken links ], [ 1 - not!secrets ], [ 0 - not!fandom ], [ 1 - too big ], [ 0 - repeat ].
Current Secret Submissions Post: here.
Suggestions, comments, and concerns should go here.

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Ever looked up the backstory or the lyrics to a song, and then regretted it because it changed your view of the song?

(For context - always liked Kate Bush's Cloudbusting, never really listened all that hard to the lyrics, but got curious and looked up the backstory, and now I can't listen to the song in the same way as before and kind of enjoy it less, although I have no idea why it's changed my view. I guess I just never connected it to something specific and in retrospect would have preferred it that way).

I definitely feel that way about a lot of country songs when you really listen to the lyrics in a lot of them, especially Taylor Swift songs (the ones that aren't released as singles)

Oh, all the time. Toto's "Africa", The Killers' "Mr. Brightside", The Fray's "How To Save A Life", not to mention the music video for The Flobots' "Handlebars"...several others. I like to interpret songs just by the lyrics, because songs I think are something that should be able to apply to a huge range of RL ideas and circumstances, the lyrics should be able to be changed and be able to morph and encapsulate wildly different ideas in the same words -- that's part of the appeal of songs.

Also, why I'm glad Don McLean always refused to explain anything about "American Pie". Makes it much better.

I always thought American Pie was about the deaths of those three 50's rockers in a plane crash, featuring anonymous mentions of as many contemporary musicians as he could possibly cram into one song

Well yes, but the fact that he keeps mum about what any of it is supposed to "mean" kinda makes the references more fun to analyze.

Now I'm curious about the backstories of Africa, Mr. Brightside, and How to Save a Life. I think I can take a guess at How to Save a Life, but I'm not 100% sure.

There's this song I liked ever since I was a kid ("No Secrets" by the band... No Secrets) but I never understood all the lyrics. One day I looked the lyrics up to discover that the song was about a girl who cheated on her boyfriend*. I was like "OMG Mom guess what that song is about???" and she looked at me like "Duh...." I'd been singing the song the whole time without understanding.

*Well all she did was kiss another boy so some people might not call that cheating but whatever.

I stay away from looking up the actual meanings of songs I like. I learned my lesson when I went searching for the music video to "Dark Blue" by Jack's Mannequin, which (thanks to a friend) I'd long associated with Doctor Who. It's a beautiful and somewhat lyrically abstract song, but the music video fails to do it justice :/

My biggest problem of reinterpretation is when somebody makes a connection I didn't - which is why I cannot listen to Katy Perry's "Firework" without associating it with Kyuube.

I always like "Son and Daughter" by Queen since I thought it had to do with challenging gender norms/the gender binary... then I heard that (apparantly) Brian May wrote it to be anti-feminist, and now I can't enjoy it anymore.

I had the opposite experience to you, op! I used to find Cloudbusting to be one of Kate Bush's duller songs, but since knowing the backstory I find it more interesting. I'm a sucker for songs about real people and obscure history, thought.

Ayrt

In a way I can enjoy it on a different level than before, but it's come at the price of the way I originally enjoyed it, and I enjoyed the associations I used to have with it a lot more than I do now the meaning's fixed. But I'm glad it's enhanced it for you heh.

Baby it's cold outside has never been the same for me since I read about how creepy/rapey it seems.

Ugh, same... at Christmas this year my family was trying to tell me it was just playful and flirty, but still... once the association is there, forever icky imo.

This. Even after reading about the original intent (http://persephonemagazine.com/2010/12/06/listening-while-feminist-in-defense-of-baby-its-cold-outside/) it still feels damn creepy unless both singers are really playing up the flirting.

Sometimes I'll be listening to a JPop/Rock song and it'll sound really cool (Kalafina comes to mind). I'll catch like every third or fourth word of what they're singing. And then I'll look up the other words I don't catch for whatever reason and I'm like, "Oh. Another song about finding love. Ho hum."

yes!

"beyond me" by after forever, seemed like this super haunting and beautifully sad song, but then i looked up the lyrics and found out it was about someone being haunted by a stalker and all the enjoyment was ruined forever

on the flipside, like an anon above said, it can work the other way around too! sometimes finding out the lyrics make a song more interesting

so it's kind of a risk, looking up the lyrics for songs i like; it might make the songs more enjoyable, just as enjoyable, or ruin them forever

(i'm esl, for reference; unless the vocalist enunciates very clearly, i rarely understand what songs are saying)

Not looking up the meaning of the lyrics exactly, but the music video for Handlebars by the the Flobots totally misses the thing I loved most about what the song's lyrics say.

In the lyrics, there's one singer. He's smart, and knowledgeable, and savvy, and hard-working, and charming, and charismatic, and well-intentioned and CAN do a lot of things. As in, he has the ability to do a whole lot of difficult things -- if he wanted to. Including, but not limited to, memorizing all the words to "De Colores", leading a nation, designing a 64 mpg engine, ending the planet in a holocaust, taking apart and putting back together a remote control, running a business, keeping rhythm with no metronome, assassinating or sending anyone he doesn't like to jail, and riding a bike with no handlebars.

In the music video, there's two narrators. One guy does all the nice innocent things, while the other guy, after doing a few of the nice innocent things along with his friend, stops and instead does all the horrible terrifying stuff.

The lyrics-only version is 10,000 times more insightful, honest, chilling, powerful, and meaningful.

To get way deep up in this, and I'm sorry in advance, but I think the point of the song is that humanity has both edges to it? So Flobots aren't going to go all Nirvana and say THE HUMAN RACE SUCKS. The idea is that as human beings we forge a path for ourselves and we can either do great things for the community or great things for ourselves alone/aka power. So the split between the two characters in the video is more about the paths one person could take after trying to prove yourself as a kid that you could ride a bike with no handlebars.

Just my take, anyway.

DA

That was originally my interpretation of the video, too, except it shows the "dove" guy doing nothing but wandering around, while at the same time the "corporate" guy is forging an ambitious path until it leads to destruction. It isn't one guy doing good things with his creativity and the other doing bad things, showing the two edges of humanity like the song does. That's why it was a weird choice.

ayrt

My takeaway from the lyrics wasn't "the human race sucks" either. And mind you, I'm not bashing the music video. I think the music video was quite spectacular, one of the best I've ever seen, the message in the video with the divergent paths and choices is a very good one -- I just think the message with one narrator not only fits the lyrics better because it remains an unbroken monologue rather than a duet, but IMHO is more powerful and more original for a song because it's all the same one guy who can make all those choices, showing how layered a single human being can be and how one person's raw power can be used for good or evil or innocent fun at any time.

A story about two guys who were at first level with each other making different choices and one going bad and one going evil is all about divergence and difference. It's not a bad story, far from it, but it doesn't have that quiet, linear build and gradual deconstruction that makes the lyrics only version so scary.

In addition, the song is all about what the narrator CAN do. His potential. The various possible futures he can dream up. All the choices he could make, if he wanted to. The music video shows what actually happened, which is a very different idea (although it can sort of be interpreted as a flashforward, which is nice.)

The thing is, the song isn't about "both edges". There's no clear divide between "this stuff is bad" and "this stuff is good". The song is about how he can do ANYTHING.

He can heal people, he can do thing for his own personal enjoyment he can create new innovative inventions, he can do things for his own ambition and wealth. He can lead a nation - they never say that he's an evil leader, he might be a fantastic one. He can run a successful business - who doesn't want to? And they never say he's an evil corporate exec. He can send anyone to prison - they never say he actually does. He has the power to let everyone die if he doesn't hand out vaccinations - they never says he lets them die or that he manipulates people with his hold over them. He can guide missiles and hit targets - they never specify who he's using the weapons against, why he's using them, or if it's for defense or assault.

It's far more ambiguous and subtle than the music video's showing two clear-cut different sides of humanity.

Completely agreed. That video is neat when it shows how friends with opposing viewpoints can clash and destroy each other in the end, but that wasn't what the song was about in the first place, it was about how human invention and achievement can get out of hand, and how it applies to all of us, no matter how innocent our beginnings or simple our creativity. They turned it into cyberpunk "average bloke versus corporations" bullshit that had nothing to do with anything.

I like the music video, and would think it was amazing if it aligned with the lyrics better, but it seems to be telling a very divergent interpretation of the lyrics, almost like a fandom fanvid.

Ironically, I think this fanvid fits the lyrics of the song a lot better than the actual music video did (you don't have to know anything about the fandom to understand the vid, it just adds an extra layer:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ly-Vhw1fevM

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[ SECRET POST #2209 ]

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