Song Interrpretation

[eclipsedmoongoddess482]

Okay, I got this project in my History class that I actually thought was pretty bitchin'. We have to choose a song and interrpret the meaning of its lyrics and what the song has to do with current issues in the world. Sounds pretty good, huh? Especially since it can be any relatively modern song (nothing earlier that the late 80s) so its almost fun. So for the next three weeks, I'm going to be posting some songs in this thread and we can all try to figure out what the songs mean.

I'll start off with something easy.

[u]Motley Crue-Wild Side[/u]

Kneel down Ye Sinners
to streetwise religion
Greed is the crown of your king
Hollywood dream teens, yesterday's trash qeens
Save the blessing for the final ring-AMEN



Thats the first verse. I'm going to take this verse by first so it isn't so overwhemling. So give your opinion and hopefull we'll all come up with a conclusion about this song and a few others.

Be on the lookout for Green Day. I had to do a lot of compramising just to add Motley into the project (I'm working with two other girls who don't like my music.) So I told them they can have a Green Day and Linkin Park song if they want. <_<

But lets have fun with this.
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Vaccum cleaners may look fun, but are deadly sex toys. as are certain vegetables like, terri schiavo -Powtaz

[rocker_gurl]

iam into the same music as you! so mebbie i can be of some help! woo go motley crue and green day!

[eclipsedmoongoddess482]

*Cough* If thats the case then maybe you can help then. Its nice that you like Motley but instead of giving constant praise, you can help me with these song lyrics.

I hope you show the same enthusiasm (well, a little more low-key) for Guns N' Roses because I changed my mind and decided that there's a GnR song that fits my project assignment much better than Wild Side.

[u]Guns N' Roses: Civil War[/u]

"What we've got here is failure to communicate.
Some men you just can't reach...
So, you get what we had here last week
Which is the way he wants it!
Well, he gets it!
N' I don't like it any more than you men."*

Look at your young men fighting
Look at your women crying
Look at your young men dying
The way they've always done before

Look at the hate we're breeding
Look at the fear we're feeding
Look at the lives we're leading
The way we've always done before

My hands are tied
The billions shift from side to side
And the wars go on with brainwashed pride
For the love of God and our human rights
And all these things are swept aside
By bloody hands time can't deny
And are washed away by your genocide
And history hides the lies of our civil wars

D'you wear a black armband
When they shot the man
Who said "Peace could last forever"
And in my first memories
They shot Kennedy
An I went numb when I learned to see
So I never fell for Vietnam
We got the wall of D.C. to remind us all
That you can't trust freedom
when it's not in your hands
When everybody's fightin'
for their promised land

And
I don't need your civil war
It feeds the rich while it buries the poor
Your power hungry sellin' soldiers
In a human grocery store
Ain't that fresh
I don't need your civil war

Look at the shoes you're filling
Look at the blood we're spilling
Look at the world we're killing
The way we've always done before
Look in the doubt we've wallowed
Look at the leaders we've followed
Look at the lies we've swallowed
And I don't want to hear no more

My hands are tied
For all I've seen has changed my mind
But still the wars go on as the years go by
With no love of God or human rights
'Cause all these dreams are swept aside
By bloody hands of the hypnotized
Who carry the cross of homicide
And history bears the scars of our civil wars

"We practice selective annihilation of mayors
and government officials
for example to create a vacuum
Then we fill that vacuum
as popular war advances.
Peace is closer"**

I don't need your civil war
It feeds the rich while it buries the poor
Your power hungry sellin' soldiers
In a human grocery store
Ain't that fresh
I don't need your civil war
I don't need your civil war
Your power hungry sellin' soldiers
In a human grocery store
Ain't that fresh
I don't need your civil war
I don't need one more war

I don't need one more war
Whaz so civil 'bout war anyway

So take this verse by verse if you have to. Remember, we're just trying to figure out what kind of message Axl was trying to bring to the public when he wrote this (besides, "Dude! I'm going to make a crapload of money for this Terminator single.")


_________________
Vaccum cleaners may look fun, but are deadly sex toys. as are certain vegetables like, terri schiavo -Powtaz

[fallenangel]

Well, Civil War is a bit more school appropriate meaning than Wild Side. Plus Wild Side is a bit blunt to analyze, except for the religious references.

Anyway, Civil War...

[i]What we've got here is failure to communicate.
Some men you just can't reach...
So, you get what we had here last week
Which is the way he wants it!
Well, he gets it!
N' I don't like it any more than you men.[/i]

A spoken quote implying the same meaning as the song. Failure to understand or convince another person, resulting in "what we had here last week" followed by a song about war.

[i]Look at your young men fighting
Look at your women crying
Look at your young men dying
The way they've always done before[/i]

Pretty straightforward. Soldiers fight, women stay home and worry about them, and some of them die. Always has and still does happen in a war.

[i]Look at the hate we're breeding
Look at the fear we're feeding
Look at the lives we're leading
The way we've always done before[/i]

By waging war, it only escalates hate. The people being attacked or those that don't agree with the conflict (outsiders or otherwise) grow bitter, and it further separates people. Everyone is more and more afraid of possible attacks and nuclear weapons used against them.

[i]My hands are tied[/i]

He's one person, unable to change it on his own.

[i]The billions shift from side to side[i/]

All the people constantly switch positions, allied with one group of people then attacking them, pro-war then anti-war...

[i]And the wars go on with brainwashed pride
For the love of God and our human rights[/i]

Besides economic reasons, wars are started to spread religion and "freedom" to people that are supposedly being denied their rights. We attack others because they don't have the same value system as we do. And citizens blindly follow them because they'll do anything "for their country" without really thinking about it or forming their own opinion.

[i]And all these things are swept aside
By bloody hands time can't deny
And are washed away by your genocide[/i]

In the process of waging war to bring these things to people, it does the exact opposite. Kills innocent people and breaks other commandments supposedly given by god, as well as taking away what little freedom the people had in the first place.

[i]And history hides the lies of our civil wars[/i]

When the story is told later, all the lies and injustices will be covered up and rewritten, as they always are.

[i]D'you wear a black armband
When they shot the man
Who said "Peace could last forever"[/i]

Self-explanatory.

[i]And in my first memories
They shot Kennedy[/i]

Also self-explanatory. One of the first things he remembers is Kennedy being shot in public, a horrible act of violence.

[i]An I went numb when I learned to see[/i]

When he realized what was happening, he became desensitized by it.

[i]So I never fell for Vietnam
We got the wall of D.C. to remind us all[/i]

Even though he didn't personally fight or die in the war, all the names of people who did are a reminder.

[i]That you can't trust freedom
when it's not in your hands
When everybody's fightin'
for their promised land[/i]

You can't believe that freedom will fix everything when you don't already have it and are in control of keeping it. In places where they're arguing over land, government, or rights, freedom won't solve those problems because one person can't force everyone else to live by it. It's up to all involved to be civil in order for freedom to work.

[i]And
I don't need your civil war[/i]

He doesn't need all the fighting between people.

[i]It feeds the rich while it buries the poor[/i]

Wealthy people get power and money from the war while the average people who have to go over and fight are killed and their families torn apart.

[i]Your power hungry sellin' soldiers
In a human grocery store
Ain't that fresh[/i]

Leaders don't treat soldiers like people but as products they can use to win a war. A death toll is just a number without a sense of the consequences of it.

[i]Look at the shoes you're filling[/i]

Look at your actions and what you're doing (ie "walk a mile in ____'s shoes")

[i]Look at the blood we're spilling[/i]

Self explanatory. Look at all the killing.

[i]Look at the world we're killing[/i]

All the violence slowly gets worse and worse, ultimately destroying the planet.

[i]Look in the doubt we've wallowed[/i]

All the second guessing and unsure actions by people have lead to this. Not being confident and siding with whatever seemed more certain than we were (ie "I don't know if Hussein has WMD's...but what if he does?....I don't know...I support the war, I guess")

[i]Look at the leaders we've followed[/i]

Self explanatory. All the war loving, power hungry, or greedy leaders that have been blindly followed.

[i]Look at the lies we've swallowed
And I don't want to hear no more[/i]

A lot of people will accept what the government says without question. "Oh, we have to attack them to free the people. Ok."

[i]My hands are tied
For all I've seen has changed my mind[/i]

Starting out believing government's reasoning is true and then changing your mind once you see all the destruction it causes without accomplishing what it was supposedly going to do.

[i]But still the wars go on as the years go by
With no love of God or human rights[/i]

One person doesn't mean anything, and wars continue to be fought without the religion or concern for other people that they're supposedly being started to protect.

[i]'Cause all these dreams are swept aside
By bloody hands of the hypnotized[/i]

All the idealistic views of peace (it can last forever) and war (it's to protect "God" and freedom) are destroyed by the people who do whatever the government tells them to do, killing millions of people in the process and doing the exact opposite of the ideals.

[i]Who carry the cross of homicide[/i]

What they do is on their shoulders.

[i]And history bears the scars of our civil wars[/i]

History is full of wars and consequences of those wars. After time, they become a scar that people look at and remember what happened, but not as strongly as at the time it happened.

Chorus 100x

Yeah, good song... His four live costume changes are amusing.
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"I care about people as much as I care about lawn furniture" - Dexter/Michael C. Hall