I think this might be a first for my Music Moment: writing about one particular song. But I mentioned this song in my previous entry, and it’s been on heavy rotation both in the CD player and in my head. This song gets to me on multiple levels. Technically, I love the way it’s structured (you can scroll down to read the lyrics and watch the video if you’d like, before you continue to read my commentary). It starts off with some quiet guitar, and Dave Grohl sings the opening lines rather sweetly. It seems like it’s going to be a ballad about love and loss, life and death, and Dave tells us everything’s gonna be all right. Then *BAM*—it kicks in, as does Dave’s powerful voice. The anguish and rage as he almost screams the lyrics makes me think of a person so frustrated and hurt by something that they get angry at someone who is trying to comfort them. And who hasn’t been there? A friend is hurting, they pour out their heart to you, and you tell them, “It’s gonna be all right, I know it.” You mean well, and you’re just trying to encourage them, but they’re just so focused on their own pain that they lash out at you: “Yeah, that’s easy for YOU to say! You’ve never been through this, you don’t know how much pain I’m in, you don’t know how I feel!” Or maybe you’ve been the one in pain, and you haven’t wanted to hear such platitudes...you just want your friend to take some of your pain away, and it makes you even angrier to know that they can’t do that, and this is something you’ll have to work through in your own heart and mind. This song just expresses that perfectly for me.
Maybe it’s because I’m approaching 50, or because I’ve had to deal with deaths of loved ones recently, but this song makes me ponder mortality. Both my own and in general. It’s an inevitability. One of these days, my heart will stop and play its final beat. The thought of that doesn’t scare me. Logically and rationally, I know it will happen, and I don’t worry about what awaits me when it does. But I find myself thinking a lot lately about just how much there still is to do and experience, and especially how many good books I want to read! I do worry about whether I’ll get everything in that I want to get in. We only get one shot at this, and we’d better make the most of it, you know?
I’m to the point where I can’t hear this song without getting choked up. Even just thinking of it in my head, like I’m doing right now, makes me a little weepy. I’ve made no secret of my love for Dave Grohl, and he’s written a lot of great, rockin’ songs in his lifetime (and I hope he has a ways to go before his heart plays its final beat). He really knocked it out of the park for me with this one, though. I’m sure I’ll never have the chance to tell him how much this song means to me, but it’s got to be a great and humbling feeling to know that something you created can touch someone so profoundly. For that, I thank you, Mr. Grohl. Long may you rock.
"These Days"
One of these days the ground will drop out from beneath your feet
One of these days your heart will stop and play its final beat
One of these days the clocks will stop and time won't mean a thing
One of these days their bombs will drop and silence everything
But it's all right
Yeah it's all right
I said it's all right
Easy for you to say
Your heart has never been broken
Your pride has never been stolen
Not yet not yet
One of these days
I bet your heart'll be broken
I bet your pride'll be stolen
I bet I bet I bet I bet
One of these days
One of these days
One of these days your eyes will close and pain will disappear
One of these days you will forget to hope and learn to fear
But it's all right
Yeah it's all right
I said it's all right
Easy for you to say
Your heart has never been broken
Your pride has never been stolen
Not yet not yet
One of these days
I bet your heart'll be broken
I bet your pride'll be stolen
I bet I bet I bet I bet
One of these days
One of these days
But it's all right
Yeah it's all right
I said it's all right
Yes it's all right
Don't say it's all right
Don't say it's all right
Don't say it's all right
One of these days your heart will stop and play its final beat
But it's all right
Easy for you to say
Your heart has never been broken
Your pride has never been stolen
Not yet not yet
One of these days
I bet your heart will be broken
I bet your pride will be stolen
I bet I bet I bet I bet
One of these days
One of these days
One of these days
You know the Tolstoy quote about happy families definitely applies here... and the emotions you feel with this song describes why I prefer to be alone... the only think that someone and their empathy or attempts at comfort does for me is increase my pain and discomfort...
ReplyDeleteThis is the kind of awareness I have constantly carried with me throughout my life... and why I feel like I am living my life now spending 'house money'...
...surprised it was a Vevo video since it was a live show... these last two entries have been really cool, Beth..!
I've always liked the Foo Fighters, but my younger brother LOVES them...any time I refer to them while talking or Facebooking with him, I call them the Pillow Biters just to get him riled up..
ReplyDeleteBut the mortality thing? Oh, I can totally feel that! After my accident where I almost died I try to enjoy life and all it's aspects good or bad more(although sometimes I slip), also after my infant sister died at a hard time as it was in my life 20 years ago, and after Guinness died...basically I'm trying to say that I think the best thing we can do is enjoy what we can, while we can,remember the good things and let the bad memories fade or not bother us as much.
And for some reason, your post with the lyrics reminds me of a poem in Dragontearz by Dean Koontz in the Book of Sorrows, which is the username I use most times because it struck me as meaningful to me and still does:
Rush headlong and hard at life
Or just sit at home and wait.
All things good and all the wrong
Will come right to you: it's fate.
Hear the music, dance if you can.
Dress in rags or wear your jewels.
Drink your choice, nurse your fear
In this old honky-tonk of fools.
Living in the modern age,
death for virtue is the wage.
So it seems in darker hours.
Evil wins, kindness cowers.
Ruled by violence and vice
we all stand upon thin ice.
Are we brave or are we mice,
here upon such thin, thin ice?
Dare we linger, dare we skate?
Dare we laugh or celebrate,
knowing we may strain the ice?
Preserve the ice at any price?
When tempest tossed,
embrace chaos.
Faraway in China,
the people sometimes say,
life is often bitter
and all too seldom gray.
Bitter as dragon tears,
great cascades of sorrow
flood down all the years,
drowning our tomorrows.
Faraway in China,
the people always say,
life is sometimes joyous
if all too often gray.
Although life is seasoned
with bitter dragon tears,
seasoning is just a spice
within our brew of years.
Bad times are only rice,
tears are one more flavour,
that gives us sustenance
sometimes we can savor.