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Interpretations:With The Dark

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Per Jade's request, here's my summary of it, though I haven't really thought this through yet.

Simply put, it sounds like it's the story of the revolution against happiness, from the perspective of the revolutionary. The girl is all things gloomy, in love with all things gloomy, and causes others ("you") to share in that gloominess. Shift in music. She likes this idea of being in love with the dark, opposite of the traditional belief (which takes place during the horn section), and the next stanza is her wanting to be rid of all those dreams and themes of the nautical (mundane) life which she never chose in the first place, probably angered at the fakeness. Aside: "Rocking my peg-leg stump, my mind naturally turns to taxidermy" is genius. Shift in music. She goes for it, and her old life and notions, disintegrated. Shift in music. She entirely embraces this new philosophy (though you can't really call it that) and proceeds to spread it. She finds herself at the head of this movement for the dismantling of societal norms, "leading the charge of the wrong"; the old values and assumptions of dark-is-bad/light-is-good were stagnant and decaying, and it was now time for a take-over to establish the new and radical. She wins. And now life is based on darkness and society is in command of the out-of-control, which I'm sure will work out fine. ~ magbatz

um, wow. I have no idea how you could do that, thanks. I've listened to this song about 40times on repeat and I figured that the three different "songs" embedded in it weren't related at all. Kind of like long fingertips. Jade

I think that this song is a battle between different bands for control over the song. The first part is an acoustic, low-key ballad about a gloomy girl. Then, the style completely changes, becoming more rowdy, and the horns come in, as if to herald the entrance of an intruder. A new band jumps in, and completely unrelated words are being sung. (I think this section is a style parody of R.E.M. The vocals sound a lot like Michael Stipe and the lyrics are erratic, awkward and unrelated even by TMBG standards - much more R.E.M. style). Soon, a third band shows up, with more breathy vocals and a more creepy and unsettling off-kilter kind of sound. Then a fourth band jumps in, with a much more poppy and guitar-driven sound, blatantly stating their purpose by screaming "We're taking over!" repeatedly. (The blatantness of their proclamation may be a parody of the simplicity and lack of depth found in many pop lyrics) Then the third band and fourth band enter a battle of sorts - the fourth band proclaims "We're taking over!" again and asserts "We're back in control", but then the third band retaliates again with more creepy and weird lyrics.

Here's my theory: Perhaps its about the rise of the emo scene. A scene all about enthusiasm for sadness and gloom is taking over. "She's in love With her broken heart" "Leading the charge of the wrong" "No more sunlight, please" --TVsKyle 20:31, 25 May 2007 (UTC)

I think you're all way off base, but I don't have any ideas of my own =P

That's not very constructive, Anonymous. If you think we're off base, why not try debunking us? Tell us why we're off base! That'd be much more interesting than random nay saying. --TVsKyle 16:39, 4 June 2007 (UTC)
I go along with the Emo -thing to a point. I feel it is about some sort of revolution or uprising gone wrong.
It starts out good, but in the end is "rusted, incrusted, combusted and dusted." So possibly the rise of the "independent" music scene. As soon as they receive a bit of notoriety they have already become what they railed against before - popular music. - fortytwo

I think It's about the shift in the music eras. The Nautical stuff is kinda like the happy jolly beatles songs... Then when It goes into the "We're taking over: which sounds like a revoultion and the she's in love with the dark, I think of it when a cultural reveloution came along. Or It describes the day music died and how after that, bands got into drugs. Then When it says she's in love with the dark, It's when everything goes and the grunge destroys the other music... Kinda like how TMBG became unpopular when grunge came into the scene. The song is a definition of culture changes in music... -user:Nerdy4ever95






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