doug galecawitz
07-14-2003, 08:10 PM
My normal disclaimer before I plow through this shit one more time: I do not actually believe any of these ideas about possible meanings to tool songs because i don't believe theyhave any specific meaning. I half believe that tool intentionaly writes ambiguous lyrics so that a broader fan base can relate to the songs and therefore sell more music and get fans to try to use their minds to find meanings that aren't there. Quite perverse, isn't it?
The main consensus about this song seems to be the theme of letting go of beliefs systems that are no longer relevant. As Thomas Jefferson once said "It is as foolish for a nation to cling to it's outdated ideals as it is for a man of 50 to try to squeeze into coat that fit him in his youth." The person in the song seems to be climbing away from the beliefs that are no longer relvant to him and reaching higher for the evolution of ideas. This is stated quite clearly in the first few lines. The water in this case would be knowledge and what's being claimed by the water are his beliefs, one by one being destroyed and shown that they were only weighing him down. The beliefs he held as comfort were actually a source of strain. Now at this point you could ask if the water should be conotated as good or bad. Destroyer or liberator. Good if the water is the liberator from illogical belief systems. Bad if it is the destroyer of that which comforts him.
The song could quite possibly be about relationships and how they are destroyed. When you are a child, mother and fathers word is law. Unbreakable and unbending and it is never wrong. As a person gets into their teens they begin to see more and more that a parent is every bit as fallible as they. When the singer keeps speaking of MINE, MINE, MINE it is like a child until they leave that type of thinking behind. Possible the flood could be about a bad relationship where you think that you love and trust your partner but then one day something occurs to you and that whole system of trust fails and destroys the love that was supported by it. Often times after a painful break up a person feels without order, sanity, or comfort. The center of their social universe has been pulled away and the behavior in public may seem erratic without the anchor that relationship to steady them. But then just as I use the word anchor one could wonder whether this pun could help clear up that the relationship was literally pulling them down or at minimum keeping them from moving forward/elevating. Likewise the water could be the creeping in of lonliness after a fialed relationship. Avoiding that lonliness could be the struggle to climb away from it.
In the world highest selling fairy tale, god floods the earth to teach man a lesson about his own sins. To clense the earth of his inner filth and decay. The song could be aluding to that as a striving for a more pure and clear ethical and moral standpoint with which to escape from the corruption, apathy, greed, violence, selfishness, and dishonesty of the majority of human beings. Again the question comes up whether this flood is a good thing or bad thing. It could be construed as good because it causes some people to self improve and that it clenses the world of negativity. While it may also be construed as bad for outright destruction of man, or at least for destruction of the diversity of human kind. A world without the wretched is a world intolerant of diversity.
I keep coming back to the idea of the water not having to be a necessarily bad thing. Water is generally held as clensing (think baptismal) and furthermore water is a necessary and life giving. Maybe what the singer fears is the unknown and they want to remain safe from something that could be quite positive for themInstead of climbing to evolve they are themselves avoiding their evoltion by climbing away. (Think "learn to swim")
At the end the singer seems to hint at his false hope that the sun would deliver him. This is reminiscent of the false idolatry portrayed in Eulogy. The truth that punishes him might not be the water but the truth that he wasted so much effort running from what he should have accepted as inevitable. Maybe the water could be the healing and purifying force in his life.
I also often think of Icarus in this song an his wings made of wax. Icarus believing he could fly to the sun made wings out of wax. As he got closer the sun melted his wings and down Icarus went. That false striving for something completely illogical only to tumble back down to the world of what is true. Like many episodes of Twilight Zone the song could be a warning as to be careful what you wish for or strive for. You may just get it and find out that it's not what you wanted.
The lines about "thought i was there, thought i was free...." remind me a little bit about myself and alot of other TOOL fans who always seem to believe we know all the answers. Delusions of this kind can be quite dangerous. Life can seem alot more fun when it throws you a curve and you were expecting something else. The way some TOOL fans carry on about opinions or beliefs they either think they know all the answers or they want others to think they know all the answers. I am always pleasantly suprised when someone exposes a hole in my theory or shows me something in a light I've not thought of before. To have the whole world figured out would make existence such a boring........well, existence! I take joy in that I don't have all the answers and probably never will. It's what makes the journey far more important than the destination.
Okay I'm coughing up bad fortune cookie philosophy it's time for bed. My condolences to any poor saps who read through this staggeringly bad philosophical diarrhea. Congradulations you have a life nearly as pathetic as mine.
VULVA
The main consensus about this song seems to be the theme of letting go of beliefs systems that are no longer relevant. As Thomas Jefferson once said "It is as foolish for a nation to cling to it's outdated ideals as it is for a man of 50 to try to squeeze into coat that fit him in his youth." The person in the song seems to be climbing away from the beliefs that are no longer relvant to him and reaching higher for the evolution of ideas. This is stated quite clearly in the first few lines. The water in this case would be knowledge and what's being claimed by the water are his beliefs, one by one being destroyed and shown that they were only weighing him down. The beliefs he held as comfort were actually a source of strain. Now at this point you could ask if the water should be conotated as good or bad. Destroyer or liberator. Good if the water is the liberator from illogical belief systems. Bad if it is the destroyer of that which comforts him.
The song could quite possibly be about relationships and how they are destroyed. When you are a child, mother and fathers word is law. Unbreakable and unbending and it is never wrong. As a person gets into their teens they begin to see more and more that a parent is every bit as fallible as they. When the singer keeps speaking of MINE, MINE, MINE it is like a child until they leave that type of thinking behind. Possible the flood could be about a bad relationship where you think that you love and trust your partner but then one day something occurs to you and that whole system of trust fails and destroys the love that was supported by it. Often times after a painful break up a person feels without order, sanity, or comfort. The center of their social universe has been pulled away and the behavior in public may seem erratic without the anchor that relationship to steady them. But then just as I use the word anchor one could wonder whether this pun could help clear up that the relationship was literally pulling them down or at minimum keeping them from moving forward/elevating. Likewise the water could be the creeping in of lonliness after a fialed relationship. Avoiding that lonliness could be the struggle to climb away from it.
In the world highest selling fairy tale, god floods the earth to teach man a lesson about his own sins. To clense the earth of his inner filth and decay. The song could be aluding to that as a striving for a more pure and clear ethical and moral standpoint with which to escape from the corruption, apathy, greed, violence, selfishness, and dishonesty of the majority of human beings. Again the question comes up whether this flood is a good thing or bad thing. It could be construed as good because it causes some people to self improve and that it clenses the world of negativity. While it may also be construed as bad for outright destruction of man, or at least for destruction of the diversity of human kind. A world without the wretched is a world intolerant of diversity.
I keep coming back to the idea of the water not having to be a necessarily bad thing. Water is generally held as clensing (think baptismal) and furthermore water is a necessary and life giving. Maybe what the singer fears is the unknown and they want to remain safe from something that could be quite positive for themInstead of climbing to evolve they are themselves avoiding their evoltion by climbing away. (Think "learn to swim")
At the end the singer seems to hint at his false hope that the sun would deliver him. This is reminiscent of the false idolatry portrayed in Eulogy. The truth that punishes him might not be the water but the truth that he wasted so much effort running from what he should have accepted as inevitable. Maybe the water could be the healing and purifying force in his life.
I also often think of Icarus in this song an his wings made of wax. Icarus believing he could fly to the sun made wings out of wax. As he got closer the sun melted his wings and down Icarus went. That false striving for something completely illogical only to tumble back down to the world of what is true. Like many episodes of Twilight Zone the song could be a warning as to be careful what you wish for or strive for. You may just get it and find out that it's not what you wanted.
The lines about "thought i was there, thought i was free...." remind me a little bit about myself and alot of other TOOL fans who always seem to believe we know all the answers. Delusions of this kind can be quite dangerous. Life can seem alot more fun when it throws you a curve and you were expecting something else. The way some TOOL fans carry on about opinions or beliefs they either think they know all the answers or they want others to think they know all the answers. I am always pleasantly suprised when someone exposes a hole in my theory or shows me something in a light I've not thought of before. To have the whole world figured out would make existence such a boring........well, existence! I take joy in that I don't have all the answers and probably never will. It's what makes the journey far more important than the destination.
Okay I'm coughing up bad fortune cookie philosophy it's time for bed. My condolences to any poor saps who read through this staggeringly bad philosophical diarrhea. Congradulations you have a life nearly as pathetic as mine.
VULVA