in listening to the new album, have you guys noticed any running themes? coz i sure have

actually, the only big one is the BIRD THEME!
"are you paying the birds to sing?"
"I'll be dizzy from growing wings"
"shes out in the park, conducting the birds"

and also, the PERSONIFICATION THEME - which i have only found in 2 songs so far (that i have conciously recognized that is)
"SIENCE wears a new suit..."
"FAITH cant fill the dance hall..."
"i hear BEAUTY crying in her sleep"


and im sure theres a few more examples of each in there, somewhere, but i just dont notice them in casually listening
know any more?
think its just conicidence? or another meaning?

colleen~

"on this the anniversary of WONDER's death"

just noticed....
(i love that im replying to my own thread, before anyone else....im not pathetic! not at all!)

colleen~

great topic

In the CBC radio 1 interview Alan pointed out how Lucky Me seems to bring up the topics of Religion and Science.

I failed that interesting because I'm not sure if I would have ever noticed. I always took the words litterlay and just cared for the sound.

i thought i heard some mother/daughter relationships, il have to keep listening.

Cameron Bay.

oh yes, sarah's always been big on her little commentaries on these topics....huge examples being "playing cards with judas" and "johnXXIII"
i love it...

"faith cant fill the dance hall coz her powers have declined...but at the beauty pageant, she will always win the prize"
i can only equate a dance hall to being a church type congregation (there are some churches taht convene in less than holy surroundings), and then saying that people dont believe enough to go to church....but they will hope and wish and pray when it comes to other trivial or vain matters. very sneaky.

im still working on decipthering "out in the park" there are so many things to unravel in this song.
[i:322abfbd91]"old disciples gathering by the boat...your revolution is chasing its tail, you love to take the wind out of my sail...but not this time"[/i:322abfbd91]
[i:322abfbd91]"its a new war...men with books run away...all the ladies quit calling them back, and start mounting a counter-attack"[/i:322abfbd91]
taken literally, men went to war, back in the day...and everyone was worried about what would happen at home while the bread winners were gone...but then, women saw that they could manage - they could get out of the kitchen and do it all themselves!
[i:322abfbd91]"trying to remember which bicycle's hers...filling her pockets with handfuls of dirt"[/i:322abfbd91]
this woman doesnt know who she is...and shes grabbing at anything she can to feel like she's becoming more...grabbing at dirt, which is the foundation of our physical world.

most of my friends think that im weird, because i dont just listen to music, but i dissect it as well...i need to know what the music is about...whats going on? what are they saying...what are they doing?
it just makes the music all the more enjoyable...its the only way to actually experience it....

erm...ill go do my homework now...
colleen~

Wonder's Death = Boy Wonder (from her musical)

I know for sure that Day One was written for the musical and I have my suspicions about When Another Midnight.

~ng

[quote:746e7557e5="colleeniee"]
"faith cant fill the dance hall coz her powers have declined...but at the beauty pageant, she will always win the prize"
i can only equate a dance hall to being a church type congregation (there are some churches taht convene in less than holy surroundings), and then saying that people dont believe enough to go to church....but they will hope and wish and pray when it comes to other trivial or vain matters. very sneaky.
[/quote:746e7557e5]

Yes I interpreted that line in a similar way, to me it was more like when people win awards (Grammy's, Oscars, beauty pageants, etc) alot of them thank God. Or, people will act like they owe so much to religion and are so 'righteous' only when it is convenient for them.

Also, there seems to be a running theme about a revolution of some sort.

Damn, this woman writes some of the best lyrics i've ever read in my life.

It seems to me as though it is just a natural thing for Sarah to personify abstract concepts like faith, science, beauty, wonder, etc. Hasn't she done it before, or am I completely nuts?

I took the contrast between Science and Faith in Lucky Me to be a statement of our society today, much in the way as colleeniee and jareed said. It seems that her presentation of Science as a businessman -- disabled, or it almost seems appropriate to use the term crippled, although I know it is incredibly un-pc -- hints at the way science is a business now. No longer is science about discovery or nature, but about the 'new suit.' I think this point hits home when she mentions that he can't 'remember [her] name' -- an impersonal business? I could be just fishing for stuff here, who knows.

"Faith can't fill the dance hall, 'cause her powers have declined" Obviously to me, this is a statement of the role that faith currently plays in our society -- compared to science, she's just a floozy with fantastical ideas -- she's associated with a dance hall, while Science is associated with a business suit and a hot breakfast(??). I think the reference to the beauty pageant is that now matter how much faith gets 'rolled in the dirt,' she will always be a concept of beauty, in that faith is something individual and intangible.

Did anyone notice the reference to France in Out In the Park? Thoughts? Even though it seems rather literal, I think this song is about war.

the overall theme of the new album to me seems to talk about some sort of revloution, either it already has begun or the world is hungry for one.

"science wears a new suit" i've always taken it as a more of positive thing. Sarah talked about this in her journal of how for this album she's incoporating the "science" into her music and with this combination of music and science, science isn't just about boring numbers and facts but now more savvy and appealing.

"Science in a three piece suit, fresh haircut and smellin' good. know what i mean? "
-ss


I also love to analyze songs, i do it naturally and i just love the way sarah writes!

one more thing about Out In the Park. I think because i've read the her blogs before i heard the song that i often connect these two. In one of her entries she was talking about how some of us are hungry for beauty and are really digging deep searching and in a sense it's a war because they are people out there who don't understant that and often neglects arts and we have to fight for that. It's sort of remind me of "Drastic Measures"

but i can see the connection of war and france in that song now you brought it up.

I think it says in the Bio section of this site that the main theme IS revolution and a renaissance. This is why I adore this cd so much. I agree that the world is in need of some sort of revolution. As a Christian, I'd love it to be a spiritual one. The world's pretty crappy now. We need to do something.

[quote="ProdigyBoy"]

In the CBC radio 1 interview Alan pointed out how Lucky Me seems to bring up the topics of Religion and Science.

quote]

IN fact, when Sarah introduces the song is concert she usually makes a point of stressing this... it's a song about science and faith and how they fight... 'why can't they just get along?' is a line I specifically remember... I think it's a really interesting theme because if you trace back far enough you'll realize that science and faith were one and the same and she seems to recognize that... though I think the song takes somewhat of a biting approach to both (Science as the greedy man in the new suit, faith as the beautiful yet always-got-a-dirty-trick-up-her-sleeve girl)... meh those are my random 1 am thoughts.

I just had a random thought this morning (It seems I have a lot of those on here)... could the 'beauty pageant' at which faith wins be tied to the "truth is beauty, beauty truth" idea? In that faith claims to BE truth while science only searches for it?
Just a thought.

wow that's deep.

haha thanks. Not sure if you're serious or not but for my own ego's sake i'll assume you are

oh, i was being sincere. no sarcasm whatsoever. that's something that's lacking these days i find... sincerity. most people seem to like to make sarcastic remarks.
anyway, i did like what you wrote. kinda left me speechless in a way.