Music Blog, Part 1: Locking Down Black Snow Birds

(the first in a 3-part series... that I will complete today. So maybe it shouldn't be cut into 3. But I want to, because the topics are different. like a lot.)

So. Right. This is a blog I had an idea for ages ago on a turbulent train trip to work in which I ended up on the wrong train, and had to jump off the train at North Strathfield and promptly forgot about it. Yes, it was the same day I made a comic about.

The train of thought was inspired by one of many PennPoint episodes where Penn Jillette talked about his feelings after seeing Paul McCartney in concert in Las Vegas. All of these had some interesting things to say, including whether an artist should respect your memory of their previous work (like Paul does) or not (like Bob Dylan), and if Sean Lennon looks frighteningly like his father (he does). The one that got my attention, though, was where Penn discussed "Blackbird", which admittedly is not one of my favourite Beatles songs, and how it's always difficult to describe poetry using prose. To sum up (though I recommend you watch all the videos), he said that people have long posited on the meaning of the lyrics of Blackbird, whether it was a personal story, or whether it was about X or Y or Civil Rights or whatever. Essays have been written (including blogs by The Beatles Complete On Ukelele, which is incredible and you should read/download all of their stuff like I have) trying to contemplate and dissect meanings from this poetry.

Then Paul McCartney came out 34 years after the song had been written and said it was about American Civil Rights.

Right.

As Penn said, him saying what he meant by the song locks down the meaning. It cements the meaning, making all other meanings false, to a given value of false. Well, rather, it makes those other meanings into mere "interpretations" and the stuff of first year university essays (I still say Poe's "The Fall of the House of Usher is a metaphor for brother-sister incest, you bastard professor). Admittedly, you could argue about the myth of the Auteur, and that the creator loses control of the work of art the moment it is released into the public, making all interpretations as real as the next until examined (sort of a Schrodinger's Song).

It's a theory I subscribe to, specifically due to the fact that I seem to be ridiculously easy to influence through music. A sad song can ruin my day. Seriously.

Anyhow, I reflect upon something I read in the liner notes of Barenaked Ladies' Greatest Hits album about the song "What a Good Boy". If you ain't heard it, go here for the video. The writer of the song explained in the notes that the song was "a young man's mediation on gender roles", but he had been sent so many interpretations and meanings for the song that were incredibly beautiful and transcended his original intention that he would prefer to let the song mean "whatever you'd like it to mean."

Sniff.

Oh, right. Snow. That Red Hot Chili Peppers song off of Stadium Arcadium. That day at North Strathfield, after I had watched Penn Point, and jumped off the train, this song came on. Now, I don't know if you know this one. I wouldn't have, had Tanja not gone through her "I must own all of the albums" phase of Chili Pepper liking.

Read the lyrics. They're here. Or watch the video.

My interpretation is that it's Anthony Kiedis having writer's block and relying on drugs to (initially) spark his creativity, despite knowing the dangers they pose, because he needs "more than himself to rely on", and that he enjoys the black-and-white morality of the addict: I need more, therefore I will get more, I am not accountable because it's not really me ("all my tracks/will be concealed").

I don't know if that's what he actually meant by the song, but that's what I think. And that matters, for a given value of matter.