Death Cab for Cutie - A Lack of Color
I'm driving to work Sunday morning and decided to explore the new artist on my i-pod 'Death Cab for Cutie'. I found out about this band through a cover version of Bjork's 'All is Full of Love' song and they did an amazing job of it.
I can't compare the 2 artists cause both of them vocally are on different levels.
I quickly changed the track cause I heard it so many times already, and was really feeling it, know what I mean? I don't know how it happened, but I started day-dreaming...and 'A Lack of Color' started to play.
The first note made me shift my eyes over to the I-pod and instantly raise the volume on the radio to hear the song clearly.
When the song ended, I replayed it....and that's all I would listen to for the next couple of days.
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http://youtube.com/watch?v=v_9SAOcD2cc
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LYRICS:
And when I see you
I really see you upside down
But my brain knows better
It picks you up and turns you around
Turns you around
Turns you around
If you feel discouraged
When there's a lack of color here
Please don't worry lover
It's really bursting at the seams
Absorbing everything
The spectrum's A to Z
This is fact, not fiction
For the first time in years
All the girls in every girlie magazine
Can't make me feel any less alone
I'm reaching for the phone
To call at 7:03
And on your machine, I slur a plea
For you to come home
But I know it's too late
I should have given you a reason to stay
Given you a reason to stay
Given you a reason to stay
Given you a reason to stay
This is fact, not fiction
For the first time in years...
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No amount of words could do this song justice, so I looked up the interpretation of this song and one very brave soul came up with something that spoke exactly what this song meant to me if not for anybody else...
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The whole song is a study of reality through the lens of opposites: inside vs. outside, fact vs. fiction, heart vs. brain. When looking at something, which view shows the soul or the truth of the matter, and which is just a shadow or filter of the truth.
In the midst of his loneliness in the aftermath of being left, he's perfecting his idea of what he had. He's longing for a perfection that he never really had. Is he longing for fact or a fiction he's created for himself?
The first stanza sets this up with the heart vs. the mind contradiction. The eye with vision (just like the heart with relationships) is the first receptor, the first judge. Because, it's first, is it closer to the original and therefore more true? or is the brain more true after it's had time to correct our eye's vision. Our brain tends to do the same thing to our heart after a while in a relationship. The brain is always catching up with our instincts.
By repeating "turns you around" several times, he's emphasizing that the brain does more than just a physical function of inverting an image, but the brain also locks onto the idea and dwells on it, dissects it, considers it over and over again and thinks it over constantly.
But is all that thinking and interpretation bringing him closer to the truth, or further from the truth. Did he really have a perfect relationship, or is he weaving a myth of perfection. Which is fact, which is fiction? The heart or the mind?
In the last lines of the song I think he realizes that he's longing for a false perfection. His reality is that he's alone now. That's the fact. The fiction is the relationship that's now over: they were together, but it couldn't work because it wasn't true. All the time they spent together was just a sham because at the heart of the matter it couldn't work.
------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
I'm open to comments / your interpretation of this song.
I can't compare the 2 artists cause both of them vocally are on different levels.
I quickly changed the track cause I heard it so many times already, and was really feeling it, know what I mean? I don't know how it happened, but I started day-dreaming...and 'A Lack of Color' started to play.
The first note made me shift my eyes over to the I-pod and instantly raise the volume on the radio to hear the song clearly.
When the song ended, I replayed it....and that's all I would listen to for the next couple of days.
------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
http://youtube.com/watch?v=v_9SAOcD2cc
------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
LYRICS:
And when I see you
I really see you upside down
But my brain knows better
It picks you up and turns you around
Turns you around
Turns you around
If you feel discouraged
When there's a lack of color here
Please don't worry lover
It's really bursting at the seams
Absorbing everything
The spectrum's A to Z
This is fact, not fiction
For the first time in years
All the girls in every girlie magazine
Can't make me feel any less alone
I'm reaching for the phone
To call at 7:03
And on your machine, I slur a plea
For you to come home
But I know it's too late
I should have given you a reason to stay
Given you a reason to stay
Given you a reason to stay
Given you a reason to stay
This is fact, not fiction
For the first time in years...
------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
No amount of words could do this song justice, so I looked up the interpretation of this song and one very brave soul came up with something that spoke exactly what this song meant to me if not for anybody else...
------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
The whole song is a study of reality through the lens of opposites: inside vs. outside, fact vs. fiction, heart vs. brain. When looking at something, which view shows the soul or the truth of the matter, and which is just a shadow or filter of the truth.
In the midst of his loneliness in the aftermath of being left, he's perfecting his idea of what he had. He's longing for a perfection that he never really had. Is he longing for fact or a fiction he's created for himself?
The first stanza sets this up with the heart vs. the mind contradiction. The eye with vision (just like the heart with relationships) is the first receptor, the first judge. Because, it's first, is it closer to the original and therefore more true? or is the brain more true after it's had time to correct our eye's vision. Our brain tends to do the same thing to our heart after a while in a relationship. The brain is always catching up with our instincts.
By repeating "turns you around" several times, he's emphasizing that the brain does more than just a physical function of inverting an image, but the brain also locks onto the idea and dwells on it, dissects it, considers it over and over again and thinks it over constantly.
But is all that thinking and interpretation bringing him closer to the truth, or further from the truth. Did he really have a perfect relationship, or is he weaving a myth of perfection. Which is fact, which is fiction? The heart or the mind?
In the last lines of the song I think he realizes that he's longing for a false perfection. His reality is that he's alone now. That's the fact. The fiction is the relationship that's now over: they were together, but it couldn't work because it wasn't true. All the time they spent together was just a sham because at the heart of the matter it couldn't work.
------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
I'm open to comments / your interpretation of this song.
posted by Sarah at
09:20
2 Comments:
I am in love with this song. Ben is a brilliant writer and composer. Its quite refreshing to listen to something like this in the midst of the noise we listen to every day (even if that noise is good, like ACDC!).
I agree with Sarah's write-up of the song, its a good way of looking at it, but I can also see another interpretation of it.
I think the song is talking about the relationship itself, not just about what HE or SHE is feeling about him or her. Its not necessarily from one person's perspective. Its from the perspective of the relationship as it looks at both of them.
'I only see you upside down...turn you around' is the relationship finally seeing both of them for who they 'supposedly' really are. I say supposedly, because both of them have tried to be the 'real' them to the other and also the 'fake' them to the other, for different moments in the relationship. So the relationship is wondering, who is the real person? Because now that its over, there's only confusion in both of them on what really happened. Who was what?
'Lack of colour' is a beautiful line. White is a lack of colour, and white only comes into existence after absorbing every other colour in the spectrum. So in this case, both he and she are saying that they absorbed and absorbed so much from each other that now since both aren't there there's nothing to absorb anymore, they had so much that it was bursting at the seams. they couldn't handle it anymore. It was too many emotions running wild. Now, there's so much left over, that they're both still 'white' or lacking colour, meaning there's so much emotion. And now that they can handle the emotion, its too late.
'Given you a reason to stay' is my favourite line. Is it him telling her? Is it him (Ben) imagining her thinking this? Who's fault is it really? We never find out in this song. Its so perfectly balanced for anyone who listens to it.
I don't know if this makes sense, but it does to my warped mind.
'...call at 7:03' haven't we all been there? Wanting to call someone at a random time, without really knowing why we're calling? But do we really not know? Are we fooling ourselves?
I love this song. Thanks for sending it to me, Sarah...
The meaning of this song is not one sided at all, it's a single realisation of both individuals in the relationship.
He really did want the relationship to work, but he too (eventually) realised that they just weren't meant to be.
Yes, everyone has a difference in opinion. And the way you see it is wonderful, but it seemed a little one-sided.
Sometimes, if we're lucky, we can see the relationship like the interpretation on my blog. And other times, we see it the way Anthony's written about it in the comments.
...and you're welcome, Anthony.
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