Death for My Birthday

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crbrazil
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Death for My Birthday

Post by crbrazil » Tue Oct 12, 2010 1:55 am

Let me guide you through the story of a boy and his curse.
Tiny diamond in his stroller. With his first step, chasing the hearse.
Sipping at a cup that's halfway filled, looking forward to the day he pays that drinking bill.

There's no peace, there's no quiet on this earth.
He can finally nestle tightly in that womb beneath the dirt.
Hurt no more, and when he turned 24, he wrote a note to nail to God's front door that said...

(Chorus)
I want death, death for my birthday.
I want death, death in the worst way.
I want death, death for my birthday.
Don't get me wrong, 'cause I love life, but life has a boyfriend.
Bless my soul, I'm out to destroy them.
I want death, death for my birthday.

For the high-paying job and the love of his life
He rode a rollercoaster ride of lust on their wedding night.
They made a baby in unmentionable ways, he was ungrateful as a man could be on that blessed day.

And underneath, he thought, 'This is all a phase.
Just a blip in the existence of the structure, vast and great.'
Praying each night to his cross of a charm, for the one thing he couldn't afford, just to buy the farm.

(Chorus)

Win or lose another friend again.
Or watch them start a war that's fought for ideals that are dead.
I'll never have an argument again.
Because my dust will be your salt.
My blood will hydrate you all.
My heart will be your meal.
And I won't ride the cycle of the way it kills to think and feel no more. No.

(Chorus)

One sweet day, his heart ceased to beat.
He fell so fast beneath all our feet
Through bugs and snakes, last words he had to say
were 'Help me claw my way to the surface.
Oh sweet Lord, you know I deserved this.
Just one more. Just one more birthday.
was i born to sink into this couch

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ratpoison
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Re: Death for My Birthday

Post by ratpoison » Wed Oct 13, 2010 10:18 pm

This song made me cry the first time I heard it!

transylvanian
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Re: Death for My Birthday

Post by transylvanian » Thu Oct 14, 2010 3:58 pm

I could never quite understand this song. The boy in question wants death through the whole song, and then when he dies, he wants to be alive again. This bears only a superficial resemblance to the Gospels, referenced here, where Max sings about the Last Supper ("My dust will be your salt," etc.). How is the boy a Christ figure?

Usually, when Max sings about Jesus, it's about a Messiah complex, i.e. someone thinking they're like Jesus, needing to save people, OR buying into such a complex, i.e.:
  • Messiah complex led a fickle flu to see its antidote and end in you
    You think you're Jesus Christ/You're not my Jesus Christ
    Have at thee False Christ, God damn you!
...and so on, or in relation to theology or Judaism, i.e.
  • Jesus died a Jew/Pupils painted blue, etc.
    They forged an image of His flesh/To brand on mugs and t-shirts, etc.
What I can't figure out is how Jesus corresponds to the boy in the song. Is he saving anyone? Because it seems to me he's "out to destroy them [life and her boyfriend]."
Love, it will not betray you, dismay or enslave you.
It will set you free. Be more like the man you were made to be.
There is a design, an alignment, a cry of my heart to see
the beauty of love as it was meant to be.
Mumford & Sons

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ratpoison
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Re: Death for My Birthday

Post by ratpoison » Thu Oct 14, 2010 5:27 pm

I don't think its about Jesus at all. Its about being depressed, suicidal, confused.

Wanting death SO bad, and only when its too late (or not), you realize there is still hope.

transylvanian
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Re: Death for My Birthday

Post by transylvanian » Thu Oct 14, 2010 5:41 pm

ratpoison wrote:I don't think its about Jesus at all. Its about being depressed, suicidal, confused.

Wanting death SO bad, and only when its too late (or not), you realize there is still hope.
Yes... that's precisely why I don't get the Jesus part of the song! Maybe I was unclear, sorry. What I mean is, what the hell does Jesus have to do with it? Why is that in there?

And I don't think he's depressed. He seems oddly well-adjusted, just, resigned to his fate, maybe. "Just a blip in the existence of some structure vast and great" doesn't show depression, it shows acceptance.
Love, it will not betray you, dismay or enslave you.
It will set you free. Be more like the man you were made to be.
There is a design, an alignment, a cry of my heart to see
the beauty of love as it was meant to be.
Mumford & Sons

Mailliw
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Re: Death for My Birthday

Post by Mailliw » Fri Oct 15, 2010 3:27 pm

Pretty sure I read max say somewhere that this was more about those people who were so religious that they focused too much on the afterlife and what was to come and diddnt think about the now. And he is criticizing those people, telling them to live life to its fullist and let what ever comes wait until your time has really come. And I think at the end the guy realizes that all the time and things he spent/did while on his time on earth meant alot to him and he wants to have another chance to live.

transylvanian
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Re: Death for My Birthday

Post by transylvanian » Fri Oct 15, 2010 4:23 pm

Mailliw wrote:Pretty sure I read max say somewhere that this was more about those people who were so religious that they focused too much on the afterlife and what was to come and diddnt think about the now. And he is criticizing those people, telling them to live life to its fullist and let what ever comes wait until your time has really come. And I think at the end the guy realizes that all the time and things he spent/did while on his time on earth meant alot to him and he wants to have another chance to live.
Yes! Thanks so much, this is great. Check this out, from Joseph Campbell, Myths to Live By:
I have heard good Christian clergymen admonish young couples at their marriage ceremonies so to live together in this life that in the world to come they may have life everlasting; and I have thought, Alas! The more appropriate mythic admonishment would be, so to live their marriages that in this world they may experience life everlasting. For there is indeed a life everlasting, a dimension of enduring human values that inheres in every act of living itself, and in the simultaneous experience and expression of which men through all time have lived and died. We all embody these unknowingly, the great being simply those who have wakened to their knowledge—as suggested in a saying attributed to Christ in the Gnostic Gospel According to Thomas: "The Kingdom of the Father is spread upon the earth and men do not see it."
Love, it will not betray you, dismay or enslave you.
It will set you free. Be more like the man you were made to be.
There is a design, an alignment, a cry of my heart to see
the beauty of love as it was meant to be.
Mumford & Sons

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ratpoison
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Re: Death for My Birthday

Post by ratpoison » Fri Oct 15, 2010 7:35 pm

Hmm, thanks for the new perspectives guys! I'll have to go back and give it another listen :)

It helped me when I was depressed, haha yay!

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