This is a song you're talking about, not a dissertation. "Weird grammar" and "intentional hogwash" is an element of poetry. Do you like your poetry reading the same way as a work of prose?
Well, I sure as heck don't want to hear things like "the less that you give, you're a taker" or "the ending is just a beginner" or that bleeding for the
dancer, whether in my poetry or in my philosophy dissertation.
But okay, let's play along, try to take everything as a poetic expression and dig out the most out of these songs.
The problem is, you are right about the fact it's song lyrics and thus a poetry of sorts. But that's where I go straight up against both Brucie and Ronnie - these songs are not
asking or
wondering, or even putting forth a proposition… the lyrics undoubtedly give off the feeling the authors
know how the world is and they're going to tell you and enlighten you regarding all those kings and queens and carbon spiders web and that great conspiracy, social or religious or whatever, which is trying to turn you away from
true enlightenment (which, for Ronnie is something between modern-day emotivism and Kierkegaard's early sort-of-voluntarism (
Enten-Eller) and for Bruce it's… the fact we will be hopping on various other planets after death, apparently, which is so close to popular misconception of Mormonism it's kinda hilarious in itself). And if they're going to assume
that position, I'm going to hold their work to a much closer scrutiny, because they more or less asked for it.
(Also, it doesn't mean you can't be philosophical
and poetic when done right, for example Wordsworth here:
"The World is too much with us us; late and soon,
Getting and spending, we lay waste our powers;
Little we see in Nature that is ours;
We have given our hearts away, a sordid boon!
This sea that bares her bosom to the moon;
The winds that will be howling at all hours,
And are up-gathered now like sleeping flowers;
For this, for everything, we are out of tune…")
Poetry or not, these songs are lyrics-wise so pompous they impose the ideology of their creators upon you… and I have a huge problem with that, because the ideology is pulled out of ass and absolutely unfounded. So Bruce took an interest in Medieval alchemy or that Crowley shit. Good for him, but to quote Janick
"What did you bring to the table?" Say what you will about Christianity or Islam or even Buddhism (the real one), but at least those are coherent
systems, where thousands of people actually gave it a thought, channelled their experiences and did everything they could to get as close to truth as possible and to find
answers. Answers they sometimes didn't even
like, but felt to be so close to truth so as to make these people be wary in their denial.
But for a song with such a pompous lyrics (of cosmic importance, so to say), what did Starblind actually tell you?
"Because afterlife must be more unimaginable than I'd ever believe, everybody else must be wrong, yet lying through their teeth to manipulate you."
The whole song seems like a very vague attack at anyone who might seem wiser than the singer. And don't try to tell me it's that whole "I know that I know nothing", because it doesn't sound that way at all. There is not a shred of humility or self-awareness that would go with the "IKTIKN" approach.
And to me, that's
malignant. To me that's much worse than any kind of Satanism, fascism or simplistic stupidity you could add to a song to make it offensive.
In a way, this is a somewhat more understated version of someone doing a song about the most out there conspiracy theories - the same root (I feel smarter than hundreds of generations before me), the same logical basis (none), the same effect (it just helps spread the shit and helps other people being immune to any counterarguments) and the same intention (to shamelessly promote the writer's ideology). And yeah, songs like that really
do exist - this one managed to get in everything, the Flat Earth, the Illuminati, the Jews, the lizard people, NASA, weed, whatever.
Bruce, I respect you as a singer, (mostly) as a frontman, as a businessman, as a fencer, as a pilot... But I have no reason to listen to your pseudo-philosophy, based on the fact you never even knew what religion is really about, because you weren't even willing to find out. Yet so full of opinions...
Ronnie was definitely right in one thing - the Devil is never a maker. He can only corrupt. Of course I'm not saying Bruce is the Devil (
), but he's not really that constructive here, now is he?
And whatever, if you want to be poetic and name our mortal coils "carbon spider's web" (and isn't that a rather convoluted way to put it?), at least remember it's definitely not the
oxygen that traps us within. Unless you want to take the whole Gnostic route and possibly promote suicide as a means of "liberation", in which case I'm going to ignore you until you decide to actually lead the way.
Also, it was Damocles'
sword what was hanging, not Damocles himself. And I really don't like the line, because "the elders" promise us
trust. Whose trust? Ours? Theirs? God's? And the (sword of) Damocles is hanging above it? Which means we will break the trust because we're afraid? They put the (sword) there (like Dionysius did) to make us wary of the trust? Wary of losing it?
I guess you could take it that the (sword) is put there in order for us to agree with "the trust" (ours, I guess), but 1.) that's not how the reference is usually used, 2.) again, I can't help but think there must be a less convoluted way to put it. This way it feels like a "huge literary reference" which was used just for the sake of putting it there. But others might feel different.
And yes, that quote
"The world is full of kings and queens who blind your eyes and steal your dreams."
and some others really do say something… and I guess it's up to the listener as to how profound he really finds it or if it's more or less stating the obvious. But no arguments there.
Anyway… please, let's leave it, fellas. I'm not going to make many friends here with my attitude and opinions and I already offended your favourite pieces of art enough.
I'm sorry for that and let's go back to making fun of all the "best song apart from" threads
