i know the character singing Friends is a girl also BYWY. but I still don't get Last words!
first i thought i was like a confession of love, but i thought it might be a suicide note. :O
Yeah I thought something like that... last words before committing suicide... I think it's quite likely.
Ok, I don’t have the album yet, but this is way too intriguing not to participate! :)
Some of you were wondering about what Fran said the first and last songs were in the story and some of you are already coming up with ideas for what’s first and last that aren’t right and it’s gonna throw you off so…Fran said in his Blog that Chinese Blues is first and BYWY is last, so that’s sorted. “The first song is the first scene and the last song is the last scene.” -Fran
Jesusaremus, you asked if Fran is always singing as J. Smith throughout the album or if there’s another character (which you were theorizing might be the girl singing in Friends). You might be on to something here because Fran did say back when he first posted the lyrics to Friends that it was written from a girl’s point of view. So, I agree with you that some songs are sung from J’s point of view, but a few may be sung from this girl’s point of view – his friend and lover. BYWY is one of the songs I HAVE heard and I thought right away that J isn’t singing this song. J is already dead and someone is singing about him and his days before, when he was young and used to sit in the sun, turn the radio on, etc. In the part where the gong comes in, this other person (probably the same girl singing on Friends) is yelling out in frustration – “If you ever need me call, you know I’ll be there when you fall, you know I will, l love you I love you..” So, she’s saying she would have been there for him, he didn’t have to kill himself and she loved him, but it’s too late…he’s gone.
That’s all I got so far…I’ll have to wait until I actually have the album to fill in the blanks, lol.
Yep I'd go with all of that. I always thought that Before You Were Young was a weird phrase though... surely before you were young is before you were born?! lol. Can someone explain that one to me...
LOL! That's because it's not grammatically correct. It should be "In the days before, you were young." not "In the days before you were young"...because like you said, that'd mean the days before he was born.
I like to thing of J. Smith as the guy in the Parrable of the Good Samaritan who's left beaten, and helpless hoping for somebody to stop. Only this time nobody stopped to help him!!
I like your thinking! Also it incorporates the slight religious hint in J. Smith :)
It would help if I knew what Chinese Blues described. If the heart attack, gun in back bit is death, how come he's alive through the rest of the album :S Maybe it's his father or someone who suffers then? *is confused*
In the song J. Smith he dies, goes to heaven and is sent to hell. But for J, earth is hell so that's where he ends up at the end of the song.
I think it's time y'all got busy with your personal story lines.
Fran, out of curiosity do the b-sides fit in with this story as well (aside from Lola, of course)? I know there is one coming up (Ballad of J. Smith if I remember correctly) that seems obvious, but what about Tail of The Tiger? Used To Belong? Or are those left over tracks from previous albums?
"The last words are hanging on my phone"... I guess this song is from the perspective of the girl too? Like, the last text he sent before he killed himself, still in her inbox. In which case, it would be after he has committed suicide, right?
I reckon J. Smith is one of the last songs in the narrative.
I like to thing of J. Smith as the guy in the Parrable of the Good Samaritan who's left beaten, and helpless hoping for somebody to stop. Only this time nobody stopped to help him!!
I like your thinking! Also it incorporates the slight religious hint in J. Smith :)
It would help if I knew what Chinese Blues described. If the heart attack, gun in back bit is death, how come he's alive through the rest of the album :S Maybe it's his father or someone who suffers then? *is confused*
James,
I this case, I don't think those words should be taken so literally, like they're happening at that moment. Just based on the words (haven’t heard the song yet), Chinese Blues seems more like the overture to the Ode to J. Smith opera, like foreshadowing what’s going to happen later on. “In time to see the shadow/number of the bus that’s running you down.” Also the bit about the "women and children weeping" could be them crying over his death that will happen later. "There was nobody keeping him here" talking about how fed up he is with life and his desire to commit suicide later on in the story. It's like a narrator is singing this song, not J. Smith himself.
I always thought that Before You Were Young was a weird phrase though... surely before you were young is before you were born?! lol. Can someone explain that one to me...
LOL! That's because it's not grammatically correct. It should be "In the days before, you were young." not "In the days before you were young"...because like you said, that'd mean the days before he was born.
That does make sense, Nikki, and I hadn't thought of that before.
I was thinking that it was sort of a way of saying "in your past life". If you think of J somehow figuring out life by the end of the album (I think that is why they sent him back to earth), and having figured it out, he's sort of reborn and young again, all that hell was "before you were young". And if it is the girl singing, she could be saying, "why did we go through this? what happened? "
I this case, I don't think those words should be taken so literally, like they're happening at that moment. Just based on the words (haven’t heard the song yet), Chinese Blues seems more like the overture to the Ode to J. Smith opera, like foreshadowing what’s going to happen later on. “In time to see the shadow/number of the bus that’s running you down.” Also the bit about the "women and children weeping" could be them crying over his death that will happen later. "There was nobody keeping him here" talking about how fed up he is with life and his desire to commit suicide later on in the story. It's like a narrator is singing this song, not J. Smith himself.
Aww, I was getting into the whole ancestry idea :P
So if we take Chinese Blues to be a sort of summary prelude synoptic introduction thing, what comes next? I am going to pluck a song out of the blue and pick... Quite Free? Boy, girl... maybe? I think Friends might be quite early on, it's unusually optimistic for Ode songs :)
I was thinking Friends to be closer to the end. Song To Self after Chinese Blues, followed by Quite Free. I think Last Words is just before, or just after J Smith. If after J Smith, it might also be after Get Up. But Get Up might come first.
I this case, I don't think those words should be taken so literally, like they're happening at that moment. Just based on the words (haven’t heard the song yet), Chinese Blues seems more like the overture to the Ode to J. Smith opera, like foreshadowing what’s going to happen later on. “In time to see the shadow/number of the bus that’s running you down.” Also the bit about the "women and children weeping" could be them crying over his death that will happen later. "There was nobody keeping him here" talking about how fed up he is with life and his desire to commit suicide later on in the story. It's like a narrator is singing this song, not J. Smith himself.
Aww, I was getting into the whole ancestry idea :P
So if we take Chinese Blues to be a sort of summary prelude synoptic introduction thing, what comes next? I am going to pluck a song out of the blue and pick... Quite Free? Boy, girl... maybe? I think Friends might be quite early on, it's unusually optimistic for Ode songs :)
Optimistic? Isn't it about loving and leaving? That's not so nice, lol.
I was thinking Friends to be closer to the end. Song To Self after Chinese Blues, followed by Quite Free. I think Last Words is just before, or just after J Smith. If after J Smith, it might also be after Get Up. But Get Up might come first.
Haha. I am trying Sir! :)
Lol, I bet that even when we have a set of rules about what follows or precedes or overlaps or all of the above we won't be able to arrange the songs in a way that doesn't break at least 9 of the conditions anyway :) Still, at least we're trying!
Optimistic? Isn't it about loving and leaving? That's not so nice, lol.
Optimistic for Ode. And isn't it about how friends won't love you and love you... to mend the fence? Or is the whole point that it's sarchastic.
Why did I ever enter this thread? Ever since its swing doors thwonked shut behind me, I've learnt that everything I thought I knew about Ode is false!
Hehe, don't worry you're trying.
I believe Friends is actually quite a bitter song. The thing is, on the surface is does seem to be a perhaps over-sentimental and slightly cheesy song about friendship (I think this is the danger about releasing it as a single, people can get the wrong impression). But actually I think it's about the person in the song (the 'girl') being kinda angry with old Johnny boy, saying "real friends don't desert you or deceive you." It seems maybe he has abandoned her and she's bitter about it? I could be barking up completely the wrong tree though.
I believe Friends is actually quite a bitter song. The thing is, on the surface is does seem to be a perhaps over-sentimental and slightly cheesy song about friendship (I think this is the danger about releasing it as a single, people can get the wrong impression). But actually I think it's about the person in the song (the 'girl') being kinda angry with old Johnny boy, saying "real friends don't desert you or deceive you." It seems maybe he has abandoned her and she's bitter about it? I could be barking up completely the wrong tree though.
"Wrote a new song today called "Friends". Written from girl to boy who treats her like shit. The studio was freezing cold. Not too keen on the cold."
Said Fran back in January. Looks like you're right, I'd always thought it was a song about how lovely friends are being sung to make a point, but no - it's about how lovely friends should be but actually aren't. *sigh* Maybe I'm a natural optimistic! *is happy again*
