Lyric Analysis – Nick Cave and the Bad Seeds and Kylie Minogue: Where the Wild Roses Grow

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Kylie Minogue, Lyric Analysis, Nick Cave, Nick Cave and the Bad Seeds, Where the Wild Roses Grow

It’s time again for another one of my lyric analysis posts. This time I’ll be looking at the haunting murder ballad ‘Where the Wild Roses Grow’ from Nick Cave and the Bad Seeds, also featuring the prominent vocals of pop superstar Kylie Minogue. This song was one of those unlikely collaborations that came off really well and creating something memorably dark as two voices narrate a brief courtship that ended in death. To this day, the song remains a strange piece of music that has a sense of Gothic romanticism to it.

‘They call me the Wild Rose/ But my name was Elisa Day/ Why they call me it, I do not know/ For my name was Elisa Day’.

These opening lines are the chorus to the song and they put the listener into a haunted mood. The melancholy tone of her voice shows that she is narrating from beyond the grave as a ghost. She seems to be aware of her death, but unsure of why she is known as The Wild Rose. This will later be explained in later lyrics.

‘From the first day I saw her I knew she was the one/ She stared in my eyes and smiled’.

It is love at first sight for this man as he seems utterly besotted with her from first glance. Yet his vocal delivery suggests the darkness that is to come.

‘For her lips were the colour of the roses/ That grew down the river, all bloody and wild’.

He speaks of how beautiful she is and highlights the main feature of her lips. Yet while comparing her to the roses seems very romantic, the mention of them being ‘bloody and wild’ is a big example of foreshadowing her doomed fate at the hands of this man.

‘When he knocked on my door and entered the room/ My trembling subsided in his sure embrace’.

She feels comfortable with him as her fears melt away. She doesn’t realise what will eventually become of her at this point and sings lovingly of his gentle demeanor that calms her. The presence of a bell ringing as she begins to sing foreshadows the fact that she is not of this world anymore and a ghost.

‘He would be my first man, and with a careful hand/ He wiped at the tears that ran down my face’.

The mention of the first gives the impression that she is virginal and not at all used to romantic love. Like with the last lines, she is under something of an illusion as he seems to be the perfect man comforting her. There is an innocence to these lines as he is the first man in her life and will be the last tragically.

Chorus

The melancholy chorus is sung again, as the sound of the music intensifies and the lead up to the tragic murder looms nearer.

‘On the second day I brought her a flower/ She’s more beautiful than any woman I’ve seen’.

He brings her a flower as a present in the custom of old-fashioned courting. He is now completely overtaken by his passion for her. The fact that he compares her to a flower and also brings her own ties the two together.

‘I said, “Do you know where the wild roses grow/
So sweet and scarlet and free?”

Here he asks her if she is aware of the roses on the riverbank were he will eventually kill her. The words he describes the roses as are ultimately what she will become as she will be free of life and scarlet will be the colour of her blood. Lines like this make me believe that the reason he kills her is because of her beauty and how he wanted it for himself, and no one else. By killing her, she was still his.

‘On the second day he came with a single red rose/ Said: “Will you give me your loss and your sorrow”.

We now go back to her recollection of the events that paint a more romantic picture of what transpired. She remembers the rose that he brought her( that probably gives an indication of why she became known in death as the Wild Rose) and how his words seemed reassuring and not threatening, when in reality the truth of his intentions was darker.

‘I nodded my head, as I lay on the bed/ “If I show you the roses will you follow?”

Her innocence is once again highlighted here as she has no idea of what will happen when she comes across the roses. She remembers him asking her to follow, and she becomes the sacrificial lamb in the end as he leads her to death. Her innocence is what makes her nod her head to his question as she is in love with him, but unaware of what will become of her.

Chorus

The sadness and darkness once again build with the second rendering of the ghoulish chorus, sung by her.

‘On the third day he took me to the river/ He showed me the roses and we kissed’

This is the day of the murder and she sets up the scene vividly. Even at this point her somewhat naive personality shines as she admires the roses and the soft kiss he gave her. The kiss can also be read as the kiss of death rather than something romantic that it seems to be for her as she unwittingly heads towards her fate.

‘And the last thing I heard was a muttered word/ As he knelt above me with a rock in his fist’.

Her last memory is the one of her death at the hands of her beloved. She was too in love with him to remember the word he muttered. The mention that he knelt above her portrays him as a predator and the fact that she doesn’t see what happens highlights the tragedy. He is almost giving her back to nature as he does describe her throughout the song as like a flower. The roses become her deathbed that she haunts.

‘On the last day I took her where the wild roses grow/ And she lay on the bank, the wind light as a thief’.

Now for the last time, we hear the man’s perspective as he kills her. He paints a haunting image of her dead on the bank with the wind gently blowing her way. Even in death, she is beautiful to him and this is the main reason he murdered her, so her beauty wouldn’t belong to anyone else.

‘And I kissed her goodbye, said “All beauty must die”/ And lent down and planted a rose between her teeth’.

He says goodbye to her in a romantic way that is very dark as she is now dead because of him. The muttered words that she spoke of earlier are probably the words he utters here, backing up the idea that he murdered her because of his obsession with not allowing anyone to gaze upon her beauty. The planting of the rose between her teeth makes her at one with nature and paints a very ghostly image. Although he killed her because of her beauty, he leaves the rose as a way to remember her.

Chorus

The last chorus is given haunting edge by the fact that she repeats the last lines three times, still unsure of why she is known by a name that wasn’t hers. These last deliveries of the lines make me believe that she is now a spectre floating on the riverbank where she was killed, consumed by melancholy questions over her demise.

 

 

 

 

 

Lyric Analysis – Sugababes: Too Lost in You

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Lyric Analysis, Sugababes, Too Lost in You

After the excellent feedback that my last lyric analysis post accumulated, I thought I should do another as I had mentioned it in my plans for this year. Today it is the turn of Too Lost in You, a dark yet sensual pop ballad by girl group Sugababes. The song was recorded for the soundtrack to the romantic movie Love Actually. I have always liked this song and found it to be catchy yet filled with a moody melancholy and obsessive passion that is hard to escape. Anyway, back to the analysis.

‘You look into my eyes, I go out of my mind.’

Immediately we are put into the frame of mind of the narrator, who is obsessed with a lover from the very first time they see one another.

‘I can’t see anything cause this love’s got me blind.’

The love may be dark and worrying, but the protagonist is too head over heels to notice. Lines such as this add to the slightly morose tone to the song, and the vocals suggest pining for a distant lover.

‘I can’t help myself, I can’t break this spell, I can’t even try.’

Everything is useless because no matter how hard to she tries to pull away, her desire pulls her down again. These lines continue a sense of darkness that makes it more than just a love song.

‘I’m in over my head, you got under my skin.’

The singer notes that the relationship could lead to ruin, yet the grip of it all won’t let her be. The introduction of a backing beat in the music pushes the song on with an ominous pulse that ties in with the sensual yet dark content present.

‘I’ve got no strength at all in the state that I’m in.’

She is made weaker by her love for this man and no amount of fighting is worth it.

‘And my knees are weak and my mouth can’t speak, fell to far this time.’

The singer acknowledges how deep she has fallen in love here, one of the few times in the song that she does. I always feel with lyrics like this the song can be read as a tale of unrequited love as there is a deep sense of worrying intensity and fragility to the singer’s voice.

‘Baby I’m too lost in you, caught in you.’

Her desire is building so much for this man, that everything she does is a reflection of it. The backing beat grows louder and more prominent in the chorus as an extension of blinding love and not being able to see anything else.

‘Lost in everything about you.’

Another example of how overtaken she is by blinded passion and love.

‘So deep, I can’t sleep, I can’t think.’

Her desperation for this man are of intense feeling as she can’t seem to function when he’s not around here.

‘I just think about the things that you do, you do.’

Even her personal view of everything is taken over by the image of her lover and what he is doing.

‘I’m too lost in you, too lost in you.’

These last lines of the chorus portray the tone of the song, a desperate and sensual ballad.

‘Well you whispered to me and I shiver inside.’

A small but subtle act of talking to someone is turned into something romantic by the singer as she becomes more entranced by this man.

‘You undo me and move me in ways undefined.’

The presence of this man does things to her that she can’t put into words, further drawing her into a sense of obsessive passion.

‘And you’re all I see and you’re all I need.’

The man who has entranced her is now the sole feature in her life, as nothing else matters except him.

‘Help me baby, help me baby, help me baby, help me now.’

She can see that this love will lead her astray and into darkness, but at this point with everything around her, it is too late to act. At this point, her voice is now pleading for release but not able to get it.

‘Cause I’m slipping away like the sand to the tide.’

Her sanity is quickly fading because of the obsession with her loved one. The use of the word slipping backs up the melancholy tone of the song as it connotes a failure to resist temptation.

‘Flowing into your arms, falling into your eyes.’

These lines continue the water motif from the last stanza, suggesting that the love is completely overtaking her and all logic is failing. The falling into your eyes shows that the love is that intense that they have almost become one person.

‘If you get too near I might disappear, I might lose my mind.’

This is one of the few times the singer sees that this love could be harmful and tries to fight it. Yet with the rest of the song, the fighting is futile because her love is blind and all-encompassing.

Chorus

The chorus is once again repeated, yet this time it feels more intense due to the vocal delivery and the presence of an electric guitar in the music.

‘I’m going crazy with love for you baby, I can’t eat and I can’t sleep.’

These lines stress the level of desperation she has been reduced to as a result of desire.

‘I’m going down like a stone in the sea, yeah no one can rescue me.’

She is now gone from any way of proper thinking or reasoning now as she plummets to the bottom of love’s abyss.

‘My baby, my baby’

Yet even though she is falling, she still affectionately calls her lover baby.

Last Chorus

For the last time the chorus is repeated, this time with the added romantic sound of strings. The use of ad-libbing in the vocals stresses the  dark romance of the song as it has a sound of asking for help about it.

 

And here is the music video for the song for you all to watch and listen to.

I can’t wait to hear everyone’s opinions on my analysis of the song.

 

Lyric Analysis- ABBA : The Day Before You Came

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ABBA, Lyric Analysis, The Day Before You Came

Music is another of my passions, aside from movies and photography. While I’ve heard people say that musical hooks make a song great, for me it is the lyrics that always get my attention. So I’m going to begin lyrical analysis of songs I’m fond of as a new topic to expand my blog. Today I’m going with an underrated song from super group ABBA. The Day Before You Came was one of their last songs before splitting and for my money, it’s a song that needs more recognition. While I know many think the song is about a woman talking of how her mundane life is changed by a lover, I have always thought there was something darker to it. Rather than being about a lover, I consider the ‘you’ in the song as being death and that the woman is talking about her existence before she died. So here are the lyrics and my analysis:

‘I must have left my house at eight because I always do/ My train I’m certain left the station just when it was due.’

These opening lyrics begin by conveying the protagonist’s daily activities, beginning with the morning. Yet there is a hesitancy to her remembrance with phrases like ‘I must’ and ‘I’m certain’ that feed into the idea that the woman is recounting her last day alive before her death.

‘I must have read the morning paper going into town/ And having gotten through the editorial no doubt I must have frowned.’

Her narration of her actions begins to detail the most minute thing, hinting at the fact that her life was very mundane and uneventful. The fact that she frowns also gives us the feeling that she is unhappy with something, probably the routine of her life.

‘I must have made my desk, around a quarter after nine/ With letters to be read, and heaps of papers waiting to be signed.’

Once again there is hesitancy to her delivery, with her not being quite sure about her time of arrival. The papers on her desk reference her dull office job which appears to have been monotonous.

‘I must have gone to lunch at half past twelve or so/ The usual place, the usual bunch.’

The presence of the word usual continues the routine in a dragging fashion. The protagonist is someone locked in a cage of time as the places she frequents are the same again and again.

‘And still on top of this, I’m pretty sure it must have rained/ The day before you came.’

The rain is an ominous warning of something sad and mournful to come, in my opinion her death and this being a hazy recollection of her last day on Earth.

‘I must have lit my seventh cigarette at half past two/ And at the time I never even noticed I was blue.’

She has become so accustomed to her life being very mundane that it has become the norm for her. Her existence is unhappy and melancholy as a result. Only in death has she now found purpose and understanding.

‘I must have kept on dragging through the business of the day/ And without really knowing anything, I hid a part of me away.’

The part of her life that desires freedom and release said been concealed for so long, she doesn’t even notice it herself. Instead she is buried in her tasks.

‘At five I must have left, there’s no exception to the rule/ A matter of routine, I’ve done it ever since I finished school.’

Her life is ruled by a rigid regime of going about business in a robot like state. The mention of school adds to the idea of her being obedient to rules and regulations. Again her recollection of the events seems hazy, further backing up my theory of this being her last day as one of the living.

‘The train back home again, undoubtedly I must have the evening paper then/ Oh yes, I’m sure my life was well within its usual frame/ The day before you came.’

Another day of no accomplishments is rounded out by her observation that her life is nothing more than just a cycle of events. The spectre of death can be seen as relieving the protagonist of this life by taking her. The following instrumental features a high-pitched wail, reminiscent of a ghost calling out which adds another ominous tone to the song.

‘I must have opened my front door at eight o’clock or so/ And stopped along the way to buy some Chinese food to go.’

She doesn’t cook herself because she is so tired from living a miserable existence.

‘I must have had my dinner watching something on TV/ There’s not, I think , a single episode of Dallas that I didn’t see.’

The program Dallas charted the eventful lives and romances of an affluent family. The irony here is the woman’s life has nothing dramatic or entertaining in it. Watching Dallas could be seen as her escape from her dull life.

‘I must have gone to bed, around a quarter after ten/ I need a lot of sleep, and so I like to be in bed by then.’

She is preparing for once again for the drudge of another day at her job that will consist of all the events she has spoken of. Only this time, she won’t have to live through the morose nature of what was once her life because the ghostly you of the title will take her away from misery.

‘I must have read a while/ The latest one by Marilyn French or something in that style.’

Marilyn French was known for her books about feminism and women asserting themselves in a man’s world. The irony is that the protagonist embodies neither of these qualities.

‘It’s funny, but I had no sense of living without aim/ The day before you came.’

Looking back on what was her life, she comes to see that her existence was plain and how she hid all that should have done away without ever really acknowledging it.

‘And turning out the light, I must have yawned and cuddled up for yet another night/ And rattling on the roof, I must have heard the sound of rain/ The day before you came.’

For the final time, she will do this routine so her turning out her light is her beckoning death to release her. The rain is a reference to what was once gloomy in her life that is now gone because the angel of death has plucked her from the hell of her old life.

 

I hope everyone has enjoyed reading my analysis and I hope you leave your opinions.