Well, in my opinion this song is about being a young & maybe a little naive &/or introverted girl and finding yourself loving a man who is at first very charming, carefree & outgoing, and seems at first to be without limits, as in
"There was a time
you opened up every doorway
you didn't mind if everything
wasn't your way"
then that man starts to gradually become more introverted & shows their more possessive/obsessive side to you as the relationship progresses, even while they keep up the appearance of being carefree & outgoing to everyone else,
"Don't pull away
that goes against what you told me
I look in your eyes
I realize what you've sold me
is love in a vacuum"
so you confront them about the way they're acting and of course they deny it,
"I think you've changed
but you insist that
that's not true"
quite possibly they are an addict of some sort, my guess would be cocaine, &/or showing very obsessive behavior towards you (early on in the video for this song we see the man hanging a picture up, it is a very large portrait of Aimee & it is prominently displayed in his/their apartment for the duration of the song), thus their "love in a vacuum",
"You look so strange, so distant
that you're hardly you
Now I can see
how you have been acting different
You say it's me
but I know
that it isn't
it's love in a vacuum"
but still you are in love with them and don't want to leave them and you know that they are truly in love with you and they don't want you to leave them either, maybe they are convinced you can save them from themself, maybe they are so broken that the possibility of an overdose &/or suicide attempt is very real and you want to get through to them that their behavior not only dangerous but it is also just pissing you off and if they don't wise up they run the risk of loosing you, as in the lines
"You will be lonely
if you leave me alone", so you want to save them but can't get through to them due to the addiction &/or emotional problems they have,
"Love in a vacuum
and that's not enough
love in a vacuum
You will be lonely
you'll be the only one who feels this way
You will be lonely
if you leave me alone
You will be lonely
you'll be the only one who feels this way
it's just not enough"
you want them to understand that the love they are giving you is not enough when it is filtered through the vacuum of their drug addiction &/or emotional impairment,
"You will be lonely
you'll be the only one who feels this way
it's just not enough
and just wait
you will be lonely
Love in a vacuum
Love in a vacuum
and that's not enough
Love in a vacuum".
'Love In A Vacuum' for me is a hauntingly truthful acute argument on the loneliness of obsession and almost inevitable loss of love that follows people who are broken in some way or another; the obsessives, the coke heads, the drunks, addicts or the just-plain-old emotionally broken; a razor sharp, lyrically driven, deceptively poppy, yet ultimately-depressing-in-the-best-way song.
Quintessential Aimee Mann.
Messenger of fear in sight
Dark deception kills the light
Hybrid children watch the sea
Pray for father, roaming free
Fearless wretch
Insanity
He watches
Lurking beneath the sea
Great old one
Forbidden site
He searches
Hunter of the shadows is rising
Immortal
In madness you dwell
Crawling chaos, underground
Cult has summoned, twisted sound
Out from ruins once possessed
Fallen city, living death
Fearless wretch
Insanity
He watches
Lurking beneath the sea
Timeless sleep
Has been upset
He awakens
Hunter of the shadows is rising
Immortal
In madness you dwell
In madness you dwell
Not dead which eternal lie
Stranger eons death may die
Drain you of your sanity
Face the thing that should not be
Fearless wretch
Insanity
He watches
Lurking beneath the sea
Great old one
Forbidden site
He searches
Hunter of the shadows is rising
Immortal
In madness you dwell
Dark deception kills the light
Hybrid children watch the sea
Pray for father, roaming free
Fearless wretch
Insanity
He watches
Lurking beneath the sea
Great old one
Forbidden site
He searches
Hunter of the shadows is rising
Immortal
In madness you dwell
Crawling chaos, underground
Cult has summoned, twisted sound
Out from ruins once possessed
Fallen city, living death
Fearless wretch
Insanity
He watches
Lurking beneath the sea
Timeless sleep
Has been upset
He awakens
Hunter of the shadows is rising
Immortal
In madness you dwell
In madness you dwell
Not dead which eternal lie
Stranger eons death may die
Drain you of your sanity
Face the thing that should not be
Fearless wretch
Insanity
He watches
Lurking beneath the sea
Great old one
Forbidden site
He searches
Hunter of the shadows is rising
Immortal
In madness you dwell
Lyrics submitted by fennsk, edited by RyanWolfeh, Ashram
The Thing That Should Not Be Lyrics as written by Lars Ulrich James Alan Hetfield
Lyrics © Word Collections Publishing
Lyrics powered by LyricFind
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Love in a Vacuum
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He reuses the verse melody from the previous album's "Dirty Little Religion", the topics of the verses are all over the place, and he packs too many words into one line (goes to show...) and too few in another (it's pretty hard to find), and rhymes "Henley Regatta" with "Persona non grata", but gets away with it all as only he could.
The Spy
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Like a lot of the other comments are saying, I think this mainly about voyeurism. If the song was about his girlfriend, then why would he use the word spy. If you are a spy it means you shouldn't be caught, that is kind of the whole point, and if you are a voyeur, the whole point of the pleasure you get from it, is the fact that the other people don't know you are watching them. See a bit of a connection there?
Fast Car
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"Fast car" is kind of a continuation of Bruce Springsteen's "Born to Run." It has all the clawing your way to a better life, but in this case the protagonist never makes it with her love; in fact she is dragged back down by him.
There is still an amazing amount of hope and will in the lyrics; and the lyrics themselve rank and easy five. If only music was stronger it would be one of those great radio songs that you hear once a week 20 years after it was released. The imagery is almost tear-jerking ("City lights lay out before us", "Speeds so fast felt like I was drunk"), and the idea of starting from nothing and just driving and working and denigrating yourself for a chance at being just above poverty, then losing in the end is just painful and inspiring at the same time.
Mountain Song
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Jane's Addiction vocalist Perry Farrell gives Adam Reader some heartfelt insight into Jane’s Addiction's hard rock manifesto "Mountain Song", which was the second single from their revolutionary album Nothing's Shocking. Mountain song was first recorded in 1986 and appeared on the soundtrack to the film Dudes starring Jon Cryer. The version on Nothing's Shocking was re-recorded in 1988.
"'Mountain Song' was actually about... I hate to say it but... drugs. Climbing this mountain and getting as high as you can, and then coming down that mountain," reveals Farrell. "What it feels to descend from the mountain top... not easy at all. The ascension is tough but exhilarating. Getting down is... it's a real bummer. Drugs is not for everybody obviously. For me, I wanted to experience the heights, and the lows come along with it."
"There's a part - 'Cash in now honey, cash in Miss Smith.' Miss Smith is my Mother; our last name was Smith. Cashing in when she cashed in her life. So... she decided that, to her... at that time, she was desperate. Life wasn't worth it for her, that was her opinion. Some people think, never take your life, and some people find that their life isn't worth living. She was in love with my Dad, and my Dad was not faithful to her, and it broke her heart. She was very desperate and she did something that I know she regrets."
Lovecraft used the term “Great Old Ones” in only two stories: in “The Call of Cthulhu” it referred to Cthulhu’s spawn, and in “At the Mountains of Madness” it was the title of the starfish-like beings who lived in Antarctica and warred with the Cthulhu-spawn!
Cthulhu is a “Great Old One” and he is of a race called the “Spawn of Cthulhu”.
Cthulhu lies "dead but dreaming" in the city of R'lyeh, a place of non-Euclidean madness presently sunken below the depths of the Pacific Ocean. timeless sleep has been upset He awakens
It is said that the "Great Old Ones" will return, causing worldwide insanity and mindless violence before finally displacing humanity forever. in madness You dwell
Cthulhu himself is served by humans, the amphibious deep ones or "hybrid children", and his own spawn. Hybrid children watch the sea Pray for Father, roaming free
Although some say it's the worst song on the CD, I like this song, even the fucked up solo, it's like all hell is breaking loose.
thats awesome..i never looked at the solo that way. kudos
This song might as well be the theme song to H.P. Lovecraft's Cthulhu Mythos. Every line of this song is related.
"Messenger of Fear in sight" A reference to Nyarlathotep, the messenger of the Old Ones.
"Hybrid children watch the sea Pray for Father, roaming free"
"Hybrids" are a reference to the offspring of Deep One / Human interbreeding. The Deep Ones are servitors of Cthulhu and Dagon, either of whom could be the "father" mentioned in the song.
"Crawling Chaos, underground cult has summoned, twisted sound"
Another reference to Nyarlathotep, who is also known as "The Crawling Chaos" or "The King in Yellow".
"Not dead which eternal lie stranger eons Death may die"
This is a version of the couplet made famous in "The Call of Cthulhu". The original version is "That is not dead which can eternal lie, for with strange aeons, even death may die".
"drain you of your sanity face The Thing That Should Not Be"
This is a refernce to what happens when humans are exposed to the old ones in Lovecraft's stories. His thesis really is that humans are insignificant in the cosmos, and that the universe does not really make sense. For example, in Lovecraft's universe, the Source of All Things is the blind idiot god, Azathoth. Humans who come too close to understanding these truths risk going insane, in that the human mind is no more caplable of withstanding these truths than our bodies are meant to withstand high speed impacts.
In many of Lovecraft's stories, insanity is the ultimate fate of his protagonists.
@Nodens <br /> Actually Hastur is the King in Yellow, who is also known as "The Unspeakable One" or "Him Who Should Not Be Named".
Readers of H.P. Lovecraft will recognize the referrences to the Cthonian mythos. The thing which should not be is Cthulu, and Apocolyptic elder God lying in a dream state within his sunken kingdom of R'lyeh.
The inspiration: The song is based upon the short story "Shadow Over Innsmouth" by H.P. Lovecraft which has been written in 1936. "Shadow Over Innsmouth" was Lovecraft's sole story which has been released as a book when he was alive. His further short stories only appeared in his lifetime in a magazine called "Weird Tales". encycmet.com/songs/smthingy.shtml
This is a really good, underated song imo.
The Thing That Should Not Be
It is about the story "Shadow Over Innsmouth"
"Messenger of fear in sight" "Dark deception kills the light" The shadow over Innsmouth
"Hybrid children watch the sea" The former leader of the citizen of Innsmouth captain Obed had an agreement with the underwater creatures. The citizens will get gold and fish from them in return that they mate with these creatures. With time every new born citizen became a hybrid between the creatures and humans "Pray for father, roaming free" The hybrids (Innsmouth citizens) were waiting for the one day when they will go underwater to live there
"Fearless wretch" "Insanity" The hero became almost mad when he slowly turned into a hybrid and he even decided his suicide, but didn't realized it. He followed the call of the water ... "He watches" "Lurking beneath the sea" One of the "Great Old Ones" was waiting for his 'children' that they would follow him under water "Great old one" "Forbidden site" The bay area where the citizen of Innsmouth were celebrating their cult rituals for the "Great Old Ones" "He searches" "Hunter of the shadows is rising" The during the night the citizens were hunting the hero of the story "Immortal" The hybrids were immortal and a few years after the hero fleed from this city ... "In madness you dwell" ... he became a hybrid too because he was a direct descendant of captain Obed
"Crawling chaos, underground" "Cult of summoned, twisted sound" The cult the citizens were celebrating in the bay area
"Out of ruins once possessed" Y'ha-nthei, the zyclope city of the underwater creaures or R'lyeh, the city of the "Great Old Ones" "Fallen city, living death" The fallen city is Innsmouth, there was nobody on the streets
"Fearless wretch" "(...)" "Timeless sleep" "Has been upset" "He awakens" Yog-Sothoth awakes from his timeless sleep "Hunter of the shadows is rising" The during the night the citizens were hunting the hero of the story "Immortal" The hybrids were immortal and a few years after the hero fleed from this city ... "In madness you dwell" ... he became a hybrid too because he was a direct descendant of captain Obed
"Not dead which eternal lie" "Stranger eons death may die" Lovecraft wrote that this would be a line of the "Necronomicon"
"Drain you of your sanity" "Face the thing that should not be" The hero accepted that he became a hybrid - he faced it in the mirror
"Fearless wretch" "(...)"
@Taco_Salad_Guy <br /> Really good explanations on many parts. Really helped me. Thanks a lot.
I don't know why anybody wouldn't like this song. It's so awesome, and I love the solo. What's really cool is when Hetfield sings "drain you of your sanity" on S&M
Kick ass song, Killer solo, one of my fav Metallica songs. Love the S&M version.
I Always this song was about the watcher in the water from the lord of the rings: the fellowship of the ring Dark deception kills the light is about the doors of durin fearless Wretch insanity He watches lurking beneath the sea great Old One forbidden site He searches Hunter of the Shadows is rising immortal in madness You dwell this is what realy made me think of it.... but the other words wouldent make sense for it so i would agree to the other book
It's been said a million times already (Nodens pretty much hit the nail on the head), but this song is HEAVILY influenced by H.P. Lovecraft's Cthulhu Mythos.
I just finished reading his short story, "The Crawling Chaos".
It's not terrifying as much as it is amazing how they could incorporate H.P. Lovecraft's tales into a song.
I mean, it blends in almost every story I've read so far.
If any of you haven't read Lovecraft's work, get to it.
i love this song. i first thought hybrid children referenced nephilim.