Tag: The Rolling Stones
Refraining from “The Living Years”
You ever encounter something in music that you initially appreciate and hold in high regard but it doesn’t stand? Time passes, you engage yourself in the ditty and it starts showing flaws that start standing out? It’s this realization that both worries you (“Am I a critic now?”) and makes you understand why the song isn’t a broad sensation that passes the test of time?
There’s a number from the 1980’s doing that to me now. In some ways I’m guilt ridden by way of it because the song is highly personal… But it’s not the song itself that gets to me. No, no, The Living Years has its merits. But the flaw is too outright.
Mike and the Mechanics 1988 song didn’t just win a Grammy – it was song of the year. The arrangement is fantastic music and the lyrics are highly personal (the relationship between Mike and his father and his father’s passing). There’s nothing I can say against those key elements and they’re not what’s hitting me the wrong way. Yet these weren’t what drew me to the song as a kid; the music complimented it and I wouldn’t engage myself in the lyrics until adulthood when I came back to the song.
What gets me, what wrings me as wrong, what stands with warts? The refrain, the chorus, the element of songs that pulls the masses in. Read More
The low and high
it was Thursday night where I think I turned a corner on my funk. I am not in a good place still, but part of my turn for the better was finding a song that I identified with that wasn’t entirely a mope. It said exactly what I was feeling.
I’ve known it for years but with thanks to mumbled lyrics by Mick Jagger (a lot of spoken word recitation) and the dreariness of the tune itself, the epiphany of the lyrics just don’t come through as strongly as they should.
Indeed, it’s a gorgeous lyrics that I so identified with from the song Out of Tears.
It’s the second verse that captured me… That and of course the lyrics in general. It’s not because of the sadness, the personal loss that’s on display. It’s how that second verse ends…
I won’t drink
I won’t eat
I can’t hear
I won’t speak
Let it out
Let it in
All this pain
From within
And I just can’t pour my heart out
To another living thing
I’m a whisper
I’m a shadow
But I’m standing up to sing
In the face of all that despair and sadness, there is a defiance. I won’t keep suffering this, life goes on and I revel in that knowledge.
At least that’s what I take from it.
During the day Friday, just casually listening to my iPod… I had my moral rebound completed with a song that I should consider cliché in it’s uplifting message to me by now. Not uplifting per se but turning-the-corner… from what I took from the lyrics of Out of Tears, George Harrison and the Beatles Here Comes the Sun was the perfect compliment. Better times are ahead… The winter has passed.
Thanks for proving me wrong, Mick
Flipping around the boob-tube, I’ve seen the Ameriquest commercials featuring Mick Jagger and the Rolling Stones… I sigh and contemplate that there is another sell-out rock group, conforming with the Man to make money.
Well, conforming only a little bit.
When you think of politics and British rock, you think of the Beatles and there mantra of Peace and Love and all that jazz (and John and Yoko telling us the War Is Over — if you want it), or Radiohead for that matter… You don’t think of the Stones, do you?
Enter Sweet Neo Con
I haven’t heard the song yet or read all the lyrics except for the stuff in the news but I am itching to see what Mick and Keith Richards are up to in this number….I don’t get like that with most protest songs…
Out of Tears….
Out Of Tears
The Rolling Stones
I can’t feel
Feel a thing
I can’t shout
I can’t scream
Breathe it out
Breathe it in
All this love
From within
I won’t cry when you say goodbye
I’m out of tears
I won’t die when you wave goodbye
I’m out of tears
Out of tears
I won’t drink
I won’t eat
I can’t hear
I won’t speak
Let it out
Let it in
All this pain
From within
And I just can’t pour my heart out
To another living thing
I’m a whisper
I’m a shadow
But I’m standing up to sing
I won’t cry when you say goodbye
I’m out of tears
I won’t die when you wave goodbye
I’m out of tears, yes I am
I won’t cry, I swear my eyes are dry
I’m out of tears
I won’t cry, I’m going to tell you why
I’m out of tears
Out of tears
Out of tears
Let it out
From within
Some you lose
Some you win
I can drift
I can dream
Til I float
Off your screen
And I just can’t pour my heart out
To another living thing
I’m a whisper
I’m a shadow
But I’m standing up to sing
I won’t cry when you say goodbye
I’m out of tears
I won’t die when you wave goodbye
I’m out of tears
Out of tears
I won’t cry, I swear my eyes are dry
I’m out of tears
Out of tears
I won’t cry, I’m going to tell you why
I’m out of tears
Out of tears
Out of tears
