Fall Out Boy's first single from their new album, "This Ain't A Scene, It's An Arms Race," has been the most (legally) downloaded song for the past four weeks. I still haven't heard it, but I did look up the lyrics just to see if it contained sexual innuendo like their previous hits.
Well, I didn't find any, but what I did find made me laugh at its blunt irony. Let's take a look at some of these lyrics:
I am an arms dealer
Fitting you with weapons in the form of words
And I don't really care, which side wins
As long as the room keeps singing
That's just the business I'm in
This ain't a scene, it’s a god damn arms race
This is what I get out of that: The guy's saying, We're feeding words to our fans, and we don't really care about the meaning of the actual words as long as everyone keeps listening to our music.
I'm a leading man
And the lies I weave are oh so intricate, oh so intricate
I love this line! Fall Out Boy is one of the most popular bands right now, and the guy here is freely admitting that they are feeding their listeners lies about life, love, and relationships. But the lies are so intricate and subtle that most people don't even notice.
...At night we're painting your trash gold while you sleep
That's my favorite line of the whole song, because in one line it describes what most of pop culture does to its listeners... it takes our trash ~ our selfishness, our pride, our lust ~ and paints it to look like gold, to make us think that we want it, that it's cool to pursue and fulfill our desires and pleasures regardless of the consequences, all while we're sleeping and don't even notice.
How many hundreds of thousands of people have this song and don't even realize what it's admitting ~ and therefore confirming the very things it's admitting: We're corrupting you, but you don't care, and we don't care, just keep giving us your money.
I'm tired of them painting our trash gold while we sleep. But I'm awake now. Are you?
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3 comments:
yeah, I'm awake now too, Mister Edmond sir. however, I'm going to be going to bed pretty soon.
seriously though, you're quite right. I'm pretty surprised that that a modern, secular band would truly realize that fact-- let alone admit it within a hit song. *shrug*
oh, by the way~ I haven't done this in awhile. I forgot to leave this at the bottom of my first one:
-the swedish eskimo
It's like alchemy, you take worthless junk and you make it shiny so people buy it. bleh.
Oh, and Edmond, glad you're back.
Finien
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