Difference between revisions of "Interpretations:We Want A Rock"

Revision as of 01:53, 14 September 2006

This one is simple. It's about needing love (awwwwwwww). But its true. Everbody wants love. the "crib" analogy is saying that all adults are really baby's needing love. And they try to hurt people and "burn the playhouse down" - and they want to stop the one;s who want love - but deep inside, "everybody wants a rock to wind a piece of string around." - sappy but true

Yeah, I thought that this was a play on the ambiguity of "we wanna rock" as a statement. I bet the idea for the song stemmed from that idea, wanting things with very little purpose. --Ed

I thought this song was a play on "We Want To Rock". However, I can't explain the "prosthetic foreheads" and "crib". --anonymous

"a rock to wind a sting around" would imply a yo-yo. componded with the fact that the yo-yo was originally a weapon everyone would want one as a method of self-defense. - empallin

I think the reason why the purpose for having a rock or prosthetic forehead is not readily apparent is because there isn't one. They are just examples of stupid things that, for some reason, catch on. Even arson will not stop the masses, who are mesmerized like babies. --another anonymous

I second the first and second anonymites. This is a genre parody song, like "I'm Def". ... Actually, having heard it a few more times on random play, I think maybe it is further than just parodying fads; it is parodying things that "everybody wants". Let the people into your little crib, because someone wants to take their prosthetic foreheads away. How crazy is that? Everybody wants prosthetic foreheads! What a lunatic! --ThirdAnonymous

Ah, by the way, in case you're as dense as I am, "if I were a carpenter I'd hammer on my piglet, I'd collect the seven dollars" refers to breaking open a piggy bank to buy the forehead. --ThirdAnonymous

As another dedicated anonymous TMBG fan, I think the "prosthetic forehead" refers to a hat. A really popular faddish hat, mind you. --Fourth anonymite

Me? I thought 'rocks and string' was a suicide reference. You know, tie yourself to a rock and throw it in the river as a weight. Prosthetic foreheads - call me a geek, but that made me think of Star Trek and their propensity to give a human a prosthetic forehead and call them an alien. --The Fifth Anonymite

When I lived in Hawaii there was lots of news about Sumo wrestling and it turns out there's a height restriction that shorter wrestlers would overcome by getting head implants to make them taller. Not quite prosthetic, but the only other explanation I can come up with for "prosthetic forehead" besides a hat or nonsense. -- scragz

I've always seen this song as people's desire to own things. The pleasure that we take in acquisition for its own sake. We believe that a new car or yo-yo or plastic surgery will make us into happier people. I was recently listening to this on my brand-new MP3 player and unfortunately the irony was not lost on me. --Heinz Kiosk

My belief is that this is a reference to how in various schools across the country, some event will precipitate a fad of all the kids bringing yo-yos or wearing baseball caps to school, causing a severe backlash from the administration and goofy zero-tolerance rules like "bring a yo-yo to school and get suspended for a week." (Of course, when this album came out in 1990, yo-yos and baseball caps were about the extent of the behavioral problems which most schools had to deal with...) --fluffy

Heinz K has come the closest to my interpretation - I, with several other people I know, reached the conclusion that this song is about religion. Everybody wants a rock (a solid foundation, faith for example) to wind a piece of string (their own insecurites) around, thus anchoring themselves more firmly to earth. The song is obviously portraying these people in a negative light, treating them as small children who, when a crib is flung open, crawl INside, rather than out, as would most actual babies. The 'Someone in this town' is some outside menace to religion, either Atheism, Reason, or some other religion, but 'everybody' (ie, all the people of the original religion, who see themselves as the only true people, thus excluding others from everybody) is strong in their faith, and won't let the invader in. The forheads bit, is, in my opinion, a comment on how religion lets people feel justified even when doing completely ridiculous things, because everyone is doing it, and under the sanction of god no less. The forheads section may also refer to the disguising nature of religion, covering people's true selves with a veneer of righteousness. --- Personman

This song, to me at least, is talking about conformity. Everybody wants to be like everybody else. You guys have bad grammar.-thegooddoctor

++ I always thought it was about people (possibly young people) who want frivolous, silly things because they are popular (for no good reason). "They" wanting to stop them from having them could be parents who realize the silliness of these materials. -D

Could it possibly be about how humans can be so easily amused by the most mundane things? Winding a piece of string around a rock sounds like a thing I'd do if I had both objects and was completely bored. And, I know from experience that wearing a prosthetic forehead can be a very exciting experience. So much that other people I've run into want to wear the forehead on their real head. -Groucho Marx

WHAT? anyway when ever i hear this song i think of Linnel with a giant forehead.

"Prosthetic foreheads" may refer the masks from children's Halloween costumes. Halloween costumes, sold in drug stores at the time, came with a thin plastic mask of a character's face. For some reason, most of these masks had very high "hairlines" and as a result, the plastic foreheads dominated half of the design. (would keep with the childhood/toy theme)

I interpret this song as being about the desire of society to limit liberty. The two things that "everybody wants" in this song are "a rock to wind a piece of string around" and "prosthetic foreheads on their real heads", which I see as symbols of weapons and personal expression, respectively. In the song we see people wanting to "burn the playhouse down", an example of society attempting to regulate artistic expression.

But I think the final clue for me is "throw the crib door wide, let the people crawl inside". In working to create rules in society against weapons, against certain forms of expression, we create systems in which we attempt to protect ourselves, like infants. The people are throwing their own crib doors wide, crawling, not as free adults, but as children of a system they created, into the prison-like symbol of a crib.

--joedecker

This song is about sex.

-- anonymous

About the prosthetic foreheads: it was sort of a running joke on "Star Trek: The Next Generation" that every alien race they encountered was just like humans (for budget reasons) except they had some kind of ridges or bumps on their foreheads, (so they would look obviously "alien"). Those bumps and ridges were done by means of gluing rubber appliances to the actors' faces; thus, prosthetic foreheads on their real heads.

-- anonymous

I think this song is about freedom of expression. Like the Fifth Anonymite, the prosthetic foreheads made me think of Star Trek--namely, Star Trek conventions at which many people dress in costume. Our culture has quite a lot of scorn for geekiness, so there would be a lot of people wanting to stop the ones with prosthetic foreheads on their heads.

 --Dairhenien

I think that far from being nonsense, and like (in my humble opinion) a lot of other TMBG songs, this song's lyrics were specifically written to defy interpretation. Every interpretation thus far has one line that just won't mesh. --Sir Gimp of Baath

I think it's the opposite of society today: We want large, complicated things, but they only want a rock to tie a string around: something even a baby could do. --The Mu

I think that rhe rock, the string, and the prosthetic forheads represent all things people like to do, that are not alowed, in some places or any(drugs, rock music, skateboarding) and the person who is trying to burn the playhouse down is the government. The crib is somewere hidden where people can do things that they want to do without being pushed around. Funny song- drworm 818/ if you want to talk about TMBG on IM be my guest.

A prosthetic forehead would be useful for someone who doesn't really want to think. --Nehushtan 17:38, 6 Mar 2006 (CST)

I thought large foreheads represented intelligence, hence wanting to artifically augment one's forehead. Generally, I do think this song is about bandwagon-jumping, and then the backlash that often results. It kind of makes me think of the music man too, in terms of the backlash against the young folks who just want to be able to have a good time at the pool hall. -E

I see this song as everybody wants the necessities (could be love, represented by a rock and a string), but everybody wants, well, what people would sometimes call wants. Wants and needs. The needs are the rock and string, could be love, as stated before, but eveyrbody wants those dang fake forheads too, 'cause they're something everybody has. The end. =) --Lemita 18:29, 9 Apr 2006 (CDT)

I think this song is about people who make up fads. This guy is making up all these things that people think are cool. But, there's this one person who thinks it's annoying and/or stupid and wants to stop it. (I know I'm probably repeating someone else's so...)- Monkiepeople99

I think Personman has a good point, but allow me to suggest my own ambiguous claim- just roll with it. I actually have 2 theories, so here they are:

1. Like Personman said, a rock represents something solid and reliable (he used the example of faith). The string represents just the opposite- mankind's emotions and insecurities. People wrap their insecurities around their "rocks", which just happen to be their material possessions. Everyone clings to their belongings, because they make people happy about what they have (the things you own end up owning you, and if you dont understand what im saying, watch Fight Club). So we have these possessions, which Linnell calls 'rocks' to stress their meaninglessness in life. The crib represents the prisons that people make for themselves by relying on material goods- they're slaves to what they own. Someone (be it a TMBG Tyler Durden) wants to burn the playhouse down (a lot like blowing up credit card buildings) to set people free from their obsession.

2. The song is about society and how easily people are influenced by those around them. Note: the title is "Everybody WANTS a rock" but how sure are we that everybody NEEDS a rock? rocks and strings are meaningless pieces of junk, but everyone's winding their string around their rocks, so naturally, the narrator wants to do it too. He even thinks hes being smart by saving up for string and a rock, but he's only following the crowd. The crib is any figurative cage that all the people crawl inside. Someone with common sense wants to break everyone free from their conformist ways, "but everybody wants a rock to wind a piece of string around". in other words, its pointless to try having people think for themselves. they'll just keep winding string around rocks 'cuz all the cool kids are doing it. Let's not even get started on the stupid prostetic foreheads they're all wearing.

-Mike (blueshotgun017)

P.S.- I don't know if anyone said this yet, but i thought of something that agrees with Personman's religion theory. The opening line to the 2nd verse is "if i were a carpenter...". Now, who from a famous religion was a carpenter? Answer: Jesus.

I think this song is from a socially liberal or possibly even a libertarian perspective (the difference being issues such as gun control and casinos and such). In my opinion "everyone" conformed or not, are the good guys. And I saw the rock as two random things that we all should have a right to do, but authority says we cant, often without a reason, or with unsound reasons to back it up. For example my school recently banned wearing anything over your head (with the exception of religious gear but including hoods) but we all wanted to wear prosthetic foreheads on our real heads. On a bigger (and more contriversial issue) there is gay marriage, now obviously not everyone wants to have a gay marriage, but everyone in that particular group waiting to get married does (my advice to you is find a church (there are ones out there) that will spiritually bond you, that will make you unnoficially married and the economic benifits shouldn't be the focus anyhow) but authority along with sodomy laws keeps the playhouse burnt down. In Summary, I think this song is about unreasonable authority.

Oh, sorry if I offended anyone by bringing up gay marriage.--Fasterthanyou 05:53, 14 September 2006 (UTC)