Problem With Forced Lyrics
Friday, April 3, 2009
I really like listening to the song Superstar by Lupe Fiasco. If you haven’t listened to it, you should. It’s a great song.
However, what isn’t great is the lyrics. They don’t make sense at all. I mean, does Lupe practice not making sense, or what? Because he’s very good at it.
Yea, uh
A fresh cool young Lu
Trying to cash his microphone check 2, 1, 2
Want to believe my own hype but it’s too untrue
The world brought me to my knees
What have you brung you?
Did you improve on the design?
Did you do something new?
Is this supposed to make sense? He flips subject so quickly he’ll fail an ACT essay.
Picture unrelated.
Who brung you? You
The more famous person, you come through
And the sexy lady next to you
You come too
And then it hit me
Standing outside of heaven waiting for God to come and get me
…And random topic shift. He does it again.
I’m too uncouth
Unschooled to the rules
And too gum shoe
Too much of a newcomer
And too uncool
Like Shadow and Lavelle
I battle with it well
Though I need a holiday like lady who sung blue
Go back what ever you did you undo
…And then he descends his lyrics into unintelligible madness as if he was a segment of Glenn Beck‘s programming.
o chauffeur chauffeur come and take me away
Cuz I been standing in this line
For like five whole days
Me and security ain’t getting along
I find that highly unlikely. Five days is a long time to stand. His lyrics are full of flaws too.
And when I got to the front they told me all of the tickets were gone
So just take me home where the mood is mellow
And the roses are grown
M&M’s are yellow
I bet he really likes M&M’s. So much so that they’re suddenly relevant to being a Superstar. Or maybe they’re just the first thing he thought about that rhymes.
And the light bulbs around my mirror don’t flicker
Everybody gets a nice autograph picture
One for you and one for your sister
Who had to work tonight but is an avid listener
Every song’s a favorite song
And mics don’t feed back
All the reviewers say you need to go and see that
And everybody claps cuz everybody is pleased
Then they all take the stage and start performing for me
Like ha ha ha ha ha
Ha ha ha ha ha
He’s laughing at us because he knows his lyrics don’t make sense at all.
It’s like he doesn’t even try to write lyrics anymore.
…And yet his song is awesome. I’ll listen to it again and again.
What’s wrong with this world?
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You think that’s bad? Try Nine Inch Nails’ stuff around the Downward Spiral era. It’s the worst because they actually do MEAN something, quite frequently, and the damn album has a story. Never can figure out what, though. Here’s one, Closer:
You let me violate you
You let me desecrate you
You let me penetrate you
You let me complicate you
[Okay, fair enough so far. It's one of those sex/violence linking songs]
(Help me…)
I broke apart my insides
(Help me…)
I’ve got no soul to sell
(Help me…)
The only thing that works for me
Help me get away from myself,
[Or not...?]
I wanna fuck you like an animal
I wanna feel you from the inside
I wanna fuck you like an animal
My whole existence is flawed
You get me closer to God
[Nope, definitely driving home that first theme with the refrain]
You can have my isolation
You can have the hate that it brings
You can have my absence of faith
You can have my everything
[God damn it.]
(Help me…)
You tear down my reason
(Help me…)
It’s your sex I can smell
(Help me…)
You make me perfect
Help me become somebody else
[I don't even know where to begin with this one.]
I wanna fuck you like an animal
I wanna feel you from the inside
I wanna fuck you like an animal
My whole existence is flawed
You get me closer to God
Through every forest
Above the trees
Within my stomach
Scraped off my knees
I drink the honey, inside your hive…
You are the reason I stay alive…
[I can't even understand this bit. As in, literally, it's distorted too much to understand. And I think it's not in the lyrics book, too. Whatever.]
I actually didn’t like this one ’till I saw the music video, which was cool. And the remixed version, Closer to God, is epic. Here’s another from that era, one of my favorites. It’s called “Ruiner”, and it comes directly after Closer.
you had all of them on your side,
didn’t you?
didn’t you?
you believed in all your lies,
didn’t you?
didn’t you?
[Fun times, I guess. He's berating somebody (been doing this for much of the album)]
the ruiner’s got a lot to prove he’s got nothing to lose and now he made you believe,
the ruiner’s your only friend well he’s the living end to the cattle he deceives,
the raping of the innocent you know the ruiner ruins everything he sees,
now the only pure thing left in my fucking world is wearing your disease.
[This part is really, really fast. And awesome. I'm pretty sure "The Ruiner" is an individual with vast power, who's in contention with the main character]
how did you get so big?
how did you get so strong?
how did it get so hard?
how did it get so long?
[Gay refrain has sex with refrains of the same gender. Also, implicit linking of sex with power, violence, again. Explicit linking, I'd say, except there's a song called Big Man With a Gun that goes pretty much the way you'd think it goes, if your mind's deep in the gutter.]
you had to give them all a sign,
didn’t you?
didn’t you?
you had to covet what was mine,
didn’t you?
didn’t you?
[The two at odds once more. The Ruiner may well be the "you" addressed here, I'm not sure. Never really understood how many characters there are in this album.]
the ruiner’s a collector he’s an infector serving his shit to his flies,
maybe there will come a day when those that you keep blind will suddenly
realize,
maybe it’s a part of me you took to a place I hoped it would never go,
and maybe that fucked me up much more than you’ll ever know.
[Again with the tirade against this "Ruiner" and now, seemingly, a definite separation of "the Ruiner" with the character being addressed. Yet both seem to be at least similar in nature; I'd guess that the "you" is a disciple of the "ruiner", perhaps, one that the main character knew at some point, perhaps.]
how did you get so big?
how did you get so strong?
how did it get so hard?
how did it get so long?
[Yes, yes, same as before but no longer whispered.]
and what you gave to me,
my perfect ring of scars,
you know I can see,
what you really are.
[Ooh, now we're getting somewhere. No idea where, though.]
you didn’t hurt me,
nothing can hurt me,
you didn’t hurt me,
nothing can stop me now
[The main character has severed himself, emotionally as well as physically, from all ties with the "you" character, I believe. He now believes himself invincible from all harm; perhaps he has realized that, for all the corruption the "ruiner" may spread, he cannot physically destroy the M.C. It is worthy to note that the song, after repeating this last section, is cut off abruptly on the word "stop"]
Okay, I looked it up a bit: APPARENTLY, the song Ruiner is meant to indicate that the M.C. fights with a Godlike figure, likely “The Ruiner” and wins; the next song, “The Becoming” would imply that he takes on this Godhood himself.
One last one, a song specifically designed to lampoon the “music industry”, the band itself, and the nature of the lyrics they right. It’s called “Starfuckers, Inc.” Yeah. Different era, though.
my god sits in the back of the limousine
my god comes in a wrapper of cellophane
my god pouts on the cover of the magazine
my god’s a shallow little bitch trying to make the scene
I have arrived and this time you should believe the hype
I listened to everyone now I know that everyone was right
I’ll be there for you as long as it works for me
I play a game
it’s called insincerity
starfuckers
starfuckers
starfuckers, incorporated
starfuckers
I am every fucking thing and just a little more
I sold my soul but don’t you dare call me a whore
and when I suck you off not a drop will go to waste
it’s really not so bad you know once you get past the taste, yeah
(asskisser)
starfuckers
starfuckers
starfuckers, incorporated
starfuckers
all our pain
how did you think we’d get by without you?
you’re so vain
I bet you think this song is about you
don’t you?
don’t you?
don’t you?
don’t you?
now I belong I’m one of the chosen ones
now I belong I’m one of the beautiful ones
This song makes no sense, and is not truly supposed to. So I’ll not bother analyzing it overmuch.
That’s a little more than I think I could listen to. I steer clear of bestiality songs.
I’ve given up on understanding lyrics all together.
Lol, that first one’s a bit much, isn’t it? There’s plenty of fairly simple ones to understand, and plenty of relatively tame (as in, tame for NIN) ones too, don’t worry.