My husband once offered the opinion that TMBG just write catchy nonsense songs. While I don’t think that’s true, I don’t think that the “just” belongs there, as writing a catchy nonsense song is probably a lot harder than it looks.
But, anyway, there are some TMBG songs that seem like pretty straightforward descriptions of real situations, such as (just to name a handful) “Lucky Ball & Chain,” “Your Racist Friend,” and “Hypontist of Ladies.” (We all know that guy. You don’t remember why you liked him.)
And other songs seem to go much deeper than the nonsense level. A couple of my favorites are on Apollo 18.
Unrelated Thing: To me, this song paints a portait of people who have been around each other too long and don’t know how to communicate anymore. I know, I’m reading much more into this than the lyrics suggest, but I have this intensely detailed mental picture this couple sitting at an outdoor table in a cafe on a sunny day, with him earnestly trying to say something, and her just gazing dreamily off in the distance. (I can describe exactly what they’re wearing and what they ordered for lunch, too, but I’m sure you don’t want to hear that.) My parents’ relationship wasn’t the greatest, and this song touches me in a tender place.
Destination Moon: On its face, you can take this song to be about someone who’s sick or injured dreaming that they could still do great things. Or you can take it in any number of metaphorical directions . . . someone who can’t admit their limitations, someone who is emotionally, rather than physically crippled but who says they’re going to go out there and try something dangerous anyway. I find it particularly interesting that all the stages of the journey are planned out and listed in the chorus: “By rocket to the Moon, by airplane to the rocket, by taxi to the airport, by front door to the taxi, by throwing back the blanket, hanging down the legs .” Notice how it works its way back from big steps to the very smallest first step, which turns out to be the hardest.
If you are looking for deep from TMBG, check out their childen’s album “No!”
All in all I find it to be a pretty subversive album, which for my taste makes it one my kids listen to all the time. The title track is a pretty clear indictment of the word children here most, “no”.
Then there is the song, I Am Not Your Broom:
Now Broom, you must now sweep for me
The dust it fills my room
No, John, I will not sweep for you
For I am not your broom
What nonsense are you speaking, Broom
My words you must obey
Another life awaits me and
I’m leaving you today
I am not your broom
I am not your broom
I’ve had enough, I’m throwing off
My chains of servitude
I am not your broom
I am not your broom
No longer must I sweep for you
For I am not your broom
From Apollo 18 I would have to say all the Fingertips tracks are without a doubt about a (wo)man’s life all the way through death. Not so deep, I could see, but still metaphorical. Same goes for Kiss Me Son of God and Whistling in the Dark.
I also haven’t made up my mind as to whether Ttriangle Man is nonsense or cryptic. You have heard the arguments of it being god, the universe, whaveter, I bet, so I’ll not mention them again.
“Older” from Long Tall Weekend: “You’re older than you’ve ever been, and now you’re even older … and now you’re older still.” Seriously, if I think about this song too much, I give myself a headache. But I am a blonde, so whatever.
On Lincoln, there are a couple of songs that are very pessimistic (not to say mean) about personal relationships: I’ve Got a Match and They’ll Need a Crane. Both of them seem to be very candid songs about relationships imploding.
I mean, sure, the same album also gave us Purple Toupee, Mr. Me, and Shoehorn With Teeth (one of the funniest songs I’ve ever heard), but they’re more than capable of doing deep stuff.
It all still sounds “quirky”, of course, but I think the Johns can’t help that.
Yeah, they can indeed be deep. One of my favorite lyrics is from “Don’t Let’s Start”:
No one in the world ever gets what they want
and that is beautiful.
Everybody dies frustrated inside
and that is beautiful.
This led to me trying (and failing) to explain the meaning of life to my niece.
Besides, how can guys who write songs about the sun (it’s a mass of incandescent gas) and President James K. Polk (Napoleon of the Stump) not be deep? I learned more from them than I did from my science or history teachers.
[QUOTE=Ichini SanshigoBesides, how can guys who write songs about the sun (it’s a mass of incandescent gas) and President James K. Polk (Napoleon of the Stump) not be deep? I learned more from them than I did from my science or history teachers.[/QUOTE]
'Cept they didn’t actually write “The Sun”.
I’m trying to think of something to add, but, uh…is “Mammals” nonsense?
My definition of “deep” may not be the same as that of others, but these songs always made me think:
Hide Away Folk Family
“Tippy-toe to the front door, Mother,
'Cause there’s a guy with a long, long fuse,
And the one thing you can’t hide is all the fear you feel inside,
As the fuse is spelling out these words:
Hide away folk family.”
Spiraling Shape
"Fogging the view, cupping face to the window,
In darkness you make out a spiralling shape.
Putting all reason aside you exchange,
What you got for a thing that’s hypnotic and strange.
The spiralling shape will make you go insane.
(Everyone wants to see that groovy thing.)"
Till My Head Falls Off
"There were 87 advil in the bottle, now there’s thirty left.
I ate 47, so what happened to the other ten?
Why do you suspiciously change the subject and break my concentration,
As I dump the bottle out and I count the advil up again?
Don’t interrupt me as I struggle to complete this thought.
Have some respect for someone more forgetful than yourself.
And I’m not done,
And I won’t be till my head falls off."
