Monday, March 18, 2013
Deathism and Music: If I Die Young Lyrics Fisking
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Artist:
The Band Perry
Lyrics:
If I die young bury me in satin
lay me down on a bed of roses
sink me in the river at dawn
send me away with the words of a love song
ooh ooh ooh ooh
If I die
young/put me into cryo/
Lay me
down/so I can be frozen…um?
Damn, I wish
we had more poetic imagery for cryonics. Since I’m more of a ‘rhymes are funny’
rather than a ‘rhymes are pretty’ person, I’m clearly not up to the task.
So anyway,
‘Bury me in satin, bed of roses…’ yeah. That’s nice – it’s detailed, it creates
a nice mental image. Good description.
I just can’t
personally relate to it.
If I die
young, throw my corpse in a wood chipper for all I care. I’m dead – I lost. Anything
short of cryonics isn’t going to give me one sliver of hope, and I’m actually
not legally allowed to sign up for it. One of the few genuine risks to the
Masquerade in modern times is anything involving the medical profession.
Especially if it’s as headline-worthy as ‘vampire cryo patient.’
Yeah, we’re
really cryo-friendly to human members, but if you’re a vampire, our main advice
is ‘don’t die.’
So yeah –
imagining my elaborately decorated deathbed isn’t all that comforting.
And besides,
just to be as overly literal and specific as possible, sending me away at dawn
would be bitterly symbolic in my case: ‘You live by the night, you die by the
day, bloodsucka!’
For another thing, it would
mean none of my vampire buddies could attend my funeral. God knows; that’s
always been a problem for me. I'm always having to disappoint human friends with my constant excuses for missing all of their daytime functions (these are people outside the community). I'm sure my fellow vampires would love some more of that.
Also I’m
allergic to roses. All of my people are. Yeah, that's one of those folkloric tropes that never really seeped into the mainstream. I mean, not a lot of human members even need a reminder about the garlic, but every now and then someone forgets about the roses, and it's one awkward birthday.
Roses aren’t as bad as something
like garlic, but we do get the sniffles and the sneezes something awful.
Romantic. Now there’s the reason I want my half my guests’ eyes watering up.
Lord make me a rainbow I'll shine down on my mother
She knows I'm safe with you as she stands under my colours
oh and life ain't always what you think it ought to be
no it ain't even grey but she buries her baby
the sharp knife of a short life
well I've had just enough time
Lord make me a rainbow I'll shine down on my mother
She knows I'm safe with you as she stands under my colours
oh and life ain't always what you think it ought to be
no it ain't even grey but she buries her baby
the sharp knife of a short life
well I've had just enough time
Atheists get asked all the
time what would happen if we meet God post-dying. Lots of people have all these
really impressive answers. Me, I’d just start the groveling. I’m talking hands
and knees, tearful, humiliated groveling. Dignity is for the lucky.
I figure that’s win-win. If
God’s actually a nice
superintelligence, my groveling will be unnecessary, harmless, and over before
I know it. If God’s an unfriendly superintelligence, well, I’ll need all the
help I can get. At least I was sent to Hell giving it my best shot.
Yeah, watching over my loved
ones, as a rainbow or otherwise, probably wouldn’t be first on my agenda. If I
was in any position to ask, I think I’d rather God did something more
substantial for them. Like, say, not letting them die horribly like I did.
I really like ‘the sharp knife
of a short life’ line, though. That’s a great one-liner. Good imagery, too.
And then you had to follow it
up with ‘well I’ve had just enough time.’
I’m 142. I could still die
young (in my culture, you’re not old until you’re 300, and maybe not even then). I
haven’t had anywhere near ‘enough time,’ as if anyone was allotted a set amount
at birth. You know, it’d be nice if we could see what it was. How overdue was I
fifty years ago? Or a hundred twenty years ago, when I decided there was no
such thing as ‘enough time?’
That line also completely
undercuts the rest of the verse. We just got the image of your mother burying
her child too young, and completely unexpectedly. You follow that up with a
generic death acceptance sentiment, and it looks forced. It also borders on
insensitive.
When I was growing up, if a
mother lost a child, she mourned for a year in keeping with Victorian mourning
practices. I don’t think trying to assuage it by saying: ‘your five-year-old
daughter had a good run’ would have helped much.
if I die young bury me in satin
lay me down on a bed of roses
sink me in the river at dawn
send me away with the words of a love song
the sharp knife of a short life
Well, I had just enough time
There’s that
line again. It clashes so damn much with the rest of this verse, it’s crazy. It
doesn’t even rhyme with any of it, or fit the rhythm at all. God, it sounds
even more abrupt in audio.
And now they've gotten me thinking about 'love songs.' Huh. The main love song sentiments are as follows: 'You're awesome;' 'You're mine;' and 'I'll love you forever.'
And now you're dead!
Sure, I guess there are some love songs that could work just as well as funeral dirges. In Titanic, 'My Heart Will Go On' was practically both. But I don't know. Knowing my luck, they'd choose something like 'I'm a Believer.'
and I'll be wearing white
when I come into your kingdom
I'm as green as the ring on my little cold finger
well I've never known the lovin' of man
but it sure felt nice when he was holdin' my hand
there's a boy here in town
who says he'll love me forever
who would have thought forever could be severed
by a sharp knife of a short life
well I've had just enough time
and I'll be wearing white
when I come into your kingdom
I'm as green as the ring on my little cold finger
well I've never known the lovin' of man
but it sure felt nice when he was holdin' my hand
there's a boy here in town
who says he'll love me forever
who would have thought forever could be severed
by a sharp knife of a short life
well I've had just enough time
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Nice. Really. Wearing white on your wedding day isn’t enough; you have to wear it to your funeral. Sneaky. Abstinence moralizing in a song about death. Nothing better than some good old medieval reinforcement of the notion that a woman’s worth is her virginity and she needs to keep it in order to die fulfilled. They even used the traditional definition of the verb ‘know.’
Not to mention some subtle
glorification of the idea that the first guy you meet when you’re young is your
True Love and grab him fast while you’re still a virgin so you can be a virgin
at marriage. Because that leads to so many happy marriages.
Fuck, the ‘green as the ring
on my little cold finger’ line is unbelievably fucking creepy. Prettying up the
horror of death gnaws at me, but this is one line short of celebrating how
great it is when someone dies before they can sin. By which I mean 'have sex.'
so put on your best boys, and I'll wear my pearls
what I never did is done
a penny for my thoughts oh no I'll sell em for a dollar
They're worth so much more after I'm a goner
and maybe then you'll hear the words that I've been singin'
it's funny when your dead how people start listenin'
Yeah, that’s
a thing that can happen. And it sucks. It's been said: ‘Once you’re dead,
you’re made for life.’ I always love it when the media targets certain
celebrities with a barrage of cruelty while they’re alive, and then they die
(sometimes through suicide) and suddenly now it’s cruel to insult them. Seems
like your timing was a little off, guys.
It’s even
worse with celebrities who die young, what with our culture romanticizing
youth, and this absurd notion that dying young means preserving that youth
because – well, at least our most recent photo of you will always be young. I
agree. Let’s take a picture of your corpse. Or where it used to be. There’s
your ‘dying young.’
However, this
is kind of hypocritical sentiment for a song that’s all about romanticizing
death. It’s also a fairly cynical sentiment in a fluffy backdrop. Clash.
Also: 'goner' and 'dollar.' Ouch.
if I die young bury me in satin
lay me down on a bed of roses
sink me in the river at dawn
send me away with the words of a love song
ooh ooh the ballad of a dove
go with peace and love
gather up your tears and keep them in your pocket
save em for a time when you're really gonna need em.
oh the sharp knife of a short life
well I've had just enough time
so put on your best boys, and I'll wear my pearls
Also: 'goner' and 'dollar.' Ouch.
if I die young bury me in satin
lay me down on a bed of roses
sink me in the river at dawn
send me away with the words of a love song
ooh ooh the ballad of a dove
go with peace and love
gather up your tears and keep them in your pocket
save em for a time when you're really gonna need em.
oh the sharp knife of a short life
well I've had just enough time
so put on your best boys, and I'll wear my pearls
So yeah: ‘if I die young, I’ll decide I really didn’t need
that lifespan anyway.’ Like if you get mugged in the street and decide you were
better off without that bag. Except then they shoot you.
I think I’d
like to split this song in two, actually. Take that previous verse (after fixing the dollar/goner pain rhyme), the ‘knife,’ and the
basic refrain. Beef it up with some more cynical lyrics, and you might have
something. The melody and voice performance definitely worked for me. Well. I
doubt this song would be even remotely controversial for many people, or the artists
even imagined the existence of a critic like me. Then again, that’s the real
problem.
‘Sour grapes’ is a coping mechanism. I get it. I just think
there are ways that we can cope with this without distorting the reality of
death or telling people not to grieve properly. Coping mechanisms can
unfortunately become problems in their own right. I tend to prefer coping
mechanisms where you do slightly more in the process than just make yourself
feel better. Or at least, coping mechanisms where your ‘feeling slightly better’
doesn’t come at a price.
Whenever I bring up anti-aging research in pretty much any context, people are rarely shy about criticizing it on a technical or ethical basis. If nothing else, it makes for a much more productive coping mechanism than pretending that death is pretty.
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