Pendulum
freshymad
Posts: 54
It's on a road trip "home" that I realize Ed intentionally makes lyrics sound vague. I could craft those first four syllables into a myriad of meanings.
This is a super condensed review of my feelings about this song. I didn't include the nuances of how the opening notes feel slow but strangely rushed, or how Stone's notes lay on top of each other or how Ed's voice cracks at "may grow." Please recognize my restraint!
This song feels like a cosmic pendulum swinging from Earth towards the Sun. When Ed sings, "My shadow left me long ago," I picture the shadow as being grounded, from which point he is flung to the highest point of the pendulum, closest to the sun ... and there, is all alone. At the top of the swing at that moment of pure weightlessness, he is stuck there, not knowing when the fall will come.
"We are here and then we go. My shadow left me long ago," could also be describing a touring band on stage under the spotlight with no shadow. The music sounds like it's being turned off after that line.
"Easy left me a long time ago." That high note gives me chills when I play it loud. Then the cutting tone of Stone's guitar sustains the chill until the next line. At that point it feels surreal, like a gazillion sparks up my spine, right through to the next line, "I'm in the fire, but I'm still cold." That severance from the elements of nature despite efforts to connect -- I know that feeling of spiritual loneliness. So sad.
"Ah, ah, ah, ah, ah." The slow dance of someone making love to you over and over again, all the while intending to bring you down with your own vulnerability or mistakes. I mean, you love so you have to conceive. All the instruments come together and then quit but the drums play on, sounding like they are about to begin a new song, which is why I have to repeat again and again. Sometimes it doesn't feel so good to obsess with a song, but okay here. Very okay.
What blows my mind is how the band's music is so sensitive to the experience that there is no need for the words. This maturity of expression is even more poignant after listening to the song "Release." The band was young and innocent. It's a song to Dad. Time is a rocking horse with the birds and the rain. It's sad, but there's a sweetness to it.
I have seen too many seconds and too many years pass by now. Holding back the tears and then letting them flow -- much like a wave, yearning for that break on the shore ... or a pendulum reaching for the sun. This song, this life, are impossible to describe with only words.
This is a super condensed review of my feelings about this song. I didn't include the nuances of how the opening notes feel slow but strangely rushed, or how Stone's notes lay on top of each other or how Ed's voice cracks at "may grow." Please recognize my restraint!
This song feels like a cosmic pendulum swinging from Earth towards the Sun. When Ed sings, "My shadow left me long ago," I picture the shadow as being grounded, from which point he is flung to the highest point of the pendulum, closest to the sun ... and there, is all alone. At the top of the swing at that moment of pure weightlessness, he is stuck there, not knowing when the fall will come.
"We are here and then we go. My shadow left me long ago," could also be describing a touring band on stage under the spotlight with no shadow. The music sounds like it's being turned off after that line.
"Easy left me a long time ago." That high note gives me chills when I play it loud. Then the cutting tone of Stone's guitar sustains the chill until the next line. At that point it feels surreal, like a gazillion sparks up my spine, right through to the next line, "I'm in the fire, but I'm still cold." That severance from the elements of nature despite efforts to connect -- I know that feeling of spiritual loneliness. So sad.
"Ah, ah, ah, ah, ah." The slow dance of someone making love to you over and over again, all the while intending to bring you down with your own vulnerability or mistakes. I mean, you love so you have to conceive. All the instruments come together and then quit but the drums play on, sounding like they are about to begin a new song, which is why I have to repeat again and again. Sometimes it doesn't feel so good to obsess with a song, but okay here. Very okay.
What blows my mind is how the band's music is so sensitive to the experience that there is no need for the words. This maturity of expression is even more poignant after listening to the song "Release." The band was young and innocent. It's a song to Dad. Time is a rocking horse with the birds and the rain. It's sad, but there's a sweetness to it.
I have seen too many seconds and too many years pass by now. Holding back the tears and then letting them flow -- much like a wave, yearning for that break on the shore ... or a pendulum reaching for the sun. This song, this life, are impossible to describe with only words.
Post edited by freshymad on
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Comments
Pendulum is by far my favorite song on this new album!!
It's great to read that one song can bring so much to a person.
2006 Arnhem 2007 Werchter 2009 Rotterdam 2010 Nijmegen 2010 Werchter
2012 Amsterdam 1 2012 Amsterdam 2 2014 Amsterdam 1 2014 Amsterdam 2
2014 Berlijn
You never really had to begin with.
Sometimes it's not the song that makes you emotional it's the people and things that come to your mind when you hear it.
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Also, my friend texted me the other night and had been watching Hawaii Five 0 and this song was featured on an episode...she's not a PJ fan like me but texts me and says "pendulum was on Hawaii Five 0" and I knew exactly what she meant....lol
Tattooed Dissident!
That show?!?!
And this song always gives me chills!
Musically, it is creative and beautiful.
Lyrically, it is immensely appreciated by anyone who has been in a tragically low emotional state.
One of my favorites on the record. Although, I have to confess, when I'm in a really great mood I have to skip over it. :(
In one of Ed's interviews he says his job as a lyricist is to listen to what the music is saying, as its own entity expressing feelings...so he is giving the music the power first that it has to make us feel and his words just help us finish the picture. I think this is why all of their songs are so powerful. They understand the profound power of sound....vibrations......
Whispered songs inside the wind,
Breathing in forgiveness
Like vibrations with no end
Hear the planet hummimg
steer us towards the clear here
I know it's already been sung
but it can't be said enough
ALL YOU NEED IS LOVE