What is this song all about? I don’t know exactly what it is about it, but I really love this one from “Fashion Nugget”. Any doper interpretations? I’m stuck.
I always got the impression that it’s about a gold-digger dismembering the corpse of her lover.
Lyrics are here.
It seems like there should be some deeper meaning behind “Short Skirt/Long Jacket,” too, but damned if I can figure it out.
A common theme in love songs…
Hrm… I’d gotten the golddigger impression, but dismembering the corpse? That’s not quite what I envisioned during the breakdown… I’ve also thought maybe that the song’s just about two rich bastards enjoying the high life.
The gold-digger part I agree with, but I figured that the whole serrated edge thing was a metaphor for emasculating him- the “rest” that she puts in the freezer is his manhood.
Corpses, gold-diggers…WTF!!!
Umm…I’d go with Ewdlorr’s note about two rich bastards enjoying the high life.
BTW Cake fans, John McCrea sings backup on the new Ben Folds album on “Fred Jones Part 2”.
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How is Ben Folds minus the other four, erm, two?
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Does anyone know the meaning of Short skirt/Long Jacket?
My friend keeps telling me its about her boyfriends mom. But I’m always skeptical about stuff like that. Though the mom does live in Sacramento and could have ties with them.
Anyone?
In regards to Short Skirt, Long Jacket, I think here the idea is that he wants a girl that looks sexy to him but conservative to the rest of the world. Hence when they are at home she is wearing a short skirt but when they go out she is wearing a long jacket. Best of both worlds, eh?
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*Originally posted by Ewdlorr *
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I think he’s damn good. I’m listening to his album right now; some of the songs sound a little too Five-esque. Like the one about the textbook hippie sounds exactly like Mess on Unauthorized Biography. But overall I’m very impressed and in love.
I sorta agree with Don Coyote on this one. It’s about wanting a girl who is both feminine and “tough”, in a corporate sense.
I love Cake.
Don’t get me started on Cake.
Too late.
Those guys rawk. They are so cool I want to be the whole band. It’s like they beamed every emotion and thought out of my head and turned it into a song.
“I want a girl with a mind like a diamond…
I want a girl with shoes that cut and-a eyes that burn like cigarettesss.”
awwww, yeaah
I never saw the whole serrated edge thing as having anything to do with emasculation - I thought that she was taking what she wanted (money), cutting out the rest of her life (wanting a guy who isn’t an island, who’s a good man, etc.) and putting it in the freezer. She does what he wants, doesn’t she - she looks nice and bounces on the Italian leather sofa. She gets money out of it and puts the rest of her life in a ziplock bag.
I kind of find it amusing that people try to find some esoteric meaning in pop songs. Usually, the obvious meaning is correct. let’s break it down line by line…
“she doesn’t care whether he is an island”-
he can live in his own world for all she cares.
“…as long as his ship’s come in”
it’s just a saying, not a literal ship. as long as he keeps rollin in the bucks, she doesn’t care.
gold watch, silk dress, Italian leather sofa - all straightforward symbols of the rich & elite.
next verse, same basic idea…
the serrated edge stuff i’m a little perplexed about. i’m pretty much in the same camp as GilaB on that. Serrated edges are also used to cut cake…my literal interpretation is that she is, in fact, cutting something from the freezer, but symbolically what Gila said.
Unless someone has a better idea…
In the studio version, you can hear the serrated edge moving back and forth before and after the music.
I believe this is about a sort of modern day Sweeney Todd. He kills people; she eats them.
Let me tour this facility and pick up some slack:
Cake wants a girl who is tough and sexy, and that’s all they want. This is not a song with layers.
You’re thinking of a different Cake song, “Short Skirt/Long Jacket” not the one in the OP (from 16 years ago).
This is what happens to dipshits like myself who respond to ancient zombie threads. They start hearing ghostly voices from the Primordial Board.
Go away pulykamell, I know your voice is only in my mind.