Fall Out Boy: Hum Hallelujah (2007)

My favorite, favorite Fall Out Boy lyrics. Let's dig right in.



Hum Hallelujah

It's all a game of this or that
Now versus then
"Better off" against "worse for wear"

And you're someone who knows someone
Who knows someone I once knew
And I just want to be a part of this

The road outside my house is paved with good intentions
Hired a construction crew 'cause it's hell on the engine
And you are the dreamer, and we are the dream
I could write it better than you ever felt it

So hum hallelujah
Just off the key of reason
I thought I loved you;
It was just how you looked in the light

A teenage vow in a parking lot:
"Til tonight do us part"
I'll sing the blues and swallow them too

My words are my faith, to hell with a good name
A remix of your guts, your insides x-rayed
And one day we'll get nostalgic for disaster
We're a bull, your ears are just a china shop

I love you in the same way there's a chapel in a hospital:
One foot in your bedroom and one foot out the door
Sometimes we take chances, sometimes we take pills
I could write it better than you ever felt it

So hum hallelujah
Just off the key of reason
I thought I loved you;
It was just how you looked in the light

A teenage vow in a parking lot:
"Til tonight do us part"
I'll sing the blues and swallow them too

-----------------

Okay! There is so much great stuff here that I'm not even sure where to start. First, some background. In 2008, Fall Out Boy lyricist and bassist Pete Wentz admitted that he once tried to kill himself:

"I got in my car. I remember I was listening to Jeff Buckley doing Leonard Cohen's ‘Hallelujah’ and sat there and took a bunch of Ativan in a Best Buy parking lot."

Perhaps not the ideal way to go out (the Best Buy is what kills it for me), but he lived to write another day and eventually turned his experiences into the words for two songs: From Under the Cork Tree's "7 Minutes in Heaven (Atavan Halen)" and this one.

So let's start at the beginning. With Wentz's suicide attempt as the core of the song (after all, it's called "Hum Hallelujah" and features a choir that sings "Hallelujah" in the exact same way as in the Leonard Cohen song), we can analyze the rest of the words as giving some insight into just why Wentz would want to kill himself.

The first verse features Wentz comparing his life at present to his life in the past, as Patrick Stump sings his lyrics: "It's all a game of...now versus then/'Better off' against 'worse for wear'". It's unclear whether "now" equates to "better off" or "worse for wear", but given the content of the the next verse and the bridge, it's pretty safe to say that Wentz is feeling pretty worse for wear.

The lines "And you're someone who knows someone/Who knows someone I once knew" speak to Wentz's new life in the spotlight, and the idea that when you're famous, everyone with even a tangential relationship to you wants to come along for the ride and reap the benefits of your hard work. The hangers-on that Wentz now has to deal with aren't even his family or friends, but iterations away; people who know people who know him. Because of this, he feels disconnected from his own life and his own success, writing, "I just want to be a part of it."

Immediately after, Wentz writes, "The road outside my house is paved with good intentions," obviously a play on the saying that the road to hell is paved with good intentions. So is Wentz's home hell? I have to assume here that he's continuing to discuss what fame has given him, so his house is probably an expensive place, representing his new life as a star. Maybe it's something that he feels he doesn't deserve or reminds him of who he used to be. Nevertheless, all of Wentz's misery stems from "good intentions"; ie- wanting to write and perform music.

"I can write it better than you ever felt it," Stump sings, and while it may be cocky of Wentz to put that out there, it's one of my favorite lines of the song. Often, people can feel their emotions but are incapable of expressing or describing them. Wentz has just the opposite problem: he has no doubt he can put the words on paper but he's having a hard time feeling much of anything.

Still, the music Wentz is helping to create is obviously still something very important to him, and the one thing to which he's holding on. Skipping the chorus for the moment, the next verse of "Hum Hallelujah" reads: "My words are my faith, to hell with a good name". He suggests that not only will he continue to write what he wants, regardless of the consequences, but that even the critics actually want to hear what he's saying, no matter what they say aloud. Inside, Wentz thinks, there's a need for his words, for Fall Out Boy's music, to be out there. "A remix of your guts, your insides x-rayed/And one day we'll get nostalgic for disaster/We're a bull, your ears are just a china shop".

But let's go back and examine the song's chorus. The two parts that make it up have a double meaning, in that they can either be discussing Wentz's troubled relationship to his own life and his own self-image culminating in his suicide attempt, or an actual relationship with another person. His lyrics recall teenage exuberance, making out in parked cars, and unreasonable, fleeting declarations of love. "So hum hallelujah/Just off the key of reason/I thought I loved you;/It was just how you looked in the light." The idea that someone can believe that they're in love with someone else just by way of the light levels is, of course, an exaggeration. But it's not that far from the truth when you're young and "just off the key of reason". Wentz further skewers the idealistic confusion of teenage lust with love when he plays on the famous marriage vow "'til death do us part". "A teenage vow in a parking lot:/'Til tonight do us part,'" he writes. This love isn't everlasting, it's one-night-only.

And then, finally, whether it's that he's over life in general or over the girl or both: "I'll sing the blues and swallow them too", clearly referring to his depressed state and his Ativan overdose.

For the final verse I'm going to focus on the first two lines, which are among my favorite by any band ever, and definitely my top Fall Out Boy lines.

"I love you in the same way there's a chapel in a hospital:/One foot in your bedroom and one foot out the door".

These lines sum up what is absolutely, insanely great about Fall Out Boy. It's not that the words themselves are particularly complex or intriguing. But Wentz brings together a mish-mash of concepts and thoughts and unifies them into a concise, clever statement that somehow actually manages to mean something in the context of the song. So let's break it down. As stated before, already know that there are two parallel threads at work here: a fleeting teenage "love," and Wentz's Ativan overdose.

As far as the former goes, given Wentz's attitude, when the line starts with "I love you in the same way..." even if you don't understand the correlation between chapels and hospitals, you know it can't be a good thing. As it turns out, it's "one foot in your bedroom and one foot out the door". This should be clear enough: he loves the girl enough to sleep with her, but not enough to commit; or, if you prefer, not enough to even spend the night with her afterward. He's only interested in the short-term benefits of the relationship.

As for the "chapel in a hospital" thing, it's something you have to wrap your head around, but I think that what Wentz is trying to get at here is how ridiculous it is to have a chapel, a place where funeral services are held, inside a hospital where people are ostensibly trying to get better. A hospital tries to keep people alive while a chapel ushers them into death, so the people in the hospital are caught in the middle, neither truly living nor truly dead, "one foot in [the] bedroom," their hospital bed, "and one foot out the door," out of life and into death.

Any way you look at it, the result is a sort of stasis between two extremes-- and as Wentz will write three years later in the song "She's My Winona": "Hell or glory/I don't want anything in between". Well, one foot in the bedroom and one out the door is neither hell nor glory, it's exactly what Wentz is looking to avoid. That average, noncommittal middle ground between love and lust, life and death, hell and glory is the worst place of all-- and Wentz needs an escape. Ativan here we come.

The last few paragraphs are quite a bit for a few simple lines, eh? Great, great stuff, and strangely, not as depressing as you'd think-- it's almost uplifting in a way, as the chorus of "hallelujahs" seems to transport Wentz (and by extension, the song) out of the mire and into a more peaceful status quo.

...well, that was a little less focused than I would have liked, but I think I got the basic message across. I suppose it's Third Generation Emo Month here at Slipping Into The Airwaves, because next week we're going to analyze a track from my current obsession, Panic! At the Disco's Vices & Virtues.

Fall Out Boy: It's Hard to Say "I Do" When I Don't (2007)

It's strange, but essentially, the previous five weeks have been about establishing my credibility and legitimizing this one post that I am about to bring you. Fall Out Boy is awesome. But I fear that their myspace-styled overexposure and post-emo roots are going to relegate them to "that one band that the teenyboppers used to like" status (if it's not at that place already). So this will be my attempt to show the naysayers that there is actually a lot to like behind the distractions of male eyeshadow and swooping haircuts. It's not even my favorite Fall Out Boy track, simply the one with which I'm currently obsessed-- and after all, I have to save something for future posts, don't I?



It's Hard to Say "I Do" When I Don't

I speak fast and I'm not gonna repeat myself
So listen carefully to every word I say:
I'm the only one who's gonna get away with making excuses today

You're appealing to emotions that I simply do not have
Blackmailed myself
'Cause I ain't got anyone else
This is a stick up
Give us all your inspiration
I've got the red carpet blues, baby

Put your hands in the air and don't make a sound
But don't get the wrong idea
We're gonna shoot you
We're gonna shoot you
And there's nothing in your head or pocket, throat or wallet
That could change just how this goes
No
We're gonna shoot you
We're gonna shoot you

When I said that I'd return to you I meant more like a relapse
Now and again I think "his and hers," "for better or worse"
But the only ring I want buried with me are the ones around my eyes

You're appealing to emotions that I simply do not have
I've got the red carpet blues baby

Put your hands in the air and don't make a sound
But don't get the wrong idea
We're gonna shoot you
We're gonna shoot you
And there's nothing in your head or pocket, throat or wallet
That could change just how this goes
And everyone shakes to the beat with a barrel down their throat
-----------------

Okay, so it doesn't exactly seem like the most eloquent writing, but there's actually a lot that's being said here. That's kind of the secret gift of Pete Wentz and Patrick Stump: to make catchy pop songs easily accessible but with multiple layers of meaning for those who are willing to dig a bit.

Before we get into the words, though, let's discuss Stump's style of singing. He often uses techniques that I've dubbed "repetition" and "withholding". I don't know if there's a real name for this kind of thing, but that's what I'm going with. This song isn't the most prominent example, but Stump will often repeat words, phrases, or even syllables, which creates a stuttering but frenetic energy in a number of Fall Out Boy's songs. You can hear this in certain lines of this track, when Stump creates a kind of vocal interplay with multiple layers of his voice: "Blackmailed myself/'Cause I ain't got ('cause I ain't got) anyone else".

Meanwhile, the witholding of certain expected lines subtlely subverts the traditionality of the verse-chorus-verse structure and is able to take the listener off-guard. You can see what I mean in the lyrics above-- the first bridge starts with "you're appealing to emotions that I simply do not have" and then has four lines in between that and "I've got the red carpet blues, baby". But when the bridge is repeated later in the song, we've now been trained to expect those middle lines-- and they're omitted entirely.

(I realize this is a common thread, but basically what I'm saying is that these songs are really, really fun to sing, once you've got the structure and timing down.)

As to the song's meaning: there's kind of three layers going on simultaneously here. Stump and Wentz have created the framework the story of a hostage situation, on which they can hang a discussion of their pet themes; namely, the music industry and troubled relationships.

So let's take a look at 1) The Hostage Situation.

This is the very surface-level interpretation of the song, taking almost everything that Stump sings literally. Ironically, considering what we just discussed about his style of singing, Stump says "I speak fast and I'm not gonna repeat myself". The first verse here is essentially the hostage-taker's instructions to his victims.

As we head into the bridge we come across probably the most important line of the song: "You're appealing to emotions that I simply do not have." It actually has a triple meaning, but in this context, we can safely assume that this is his way of quieting the pleas of his hostages; telling them that he doesn't have any sympathy for them. His desperation comes from loneliness ("I ain't got anyone else") and depression (he's holding these people hostage for their "inspiration"). And on this pass, "red carpet blues" brings to mind images of bloodstains.

The chorus is pretty self-explanatory, if a bit snide-- essentially Stump sings that everyone is going to get shot regardless of what they do, regardless of whether or not they follow his instructions. "Put your hands in the air...But don't get the wrong idea/We're gonna shoot you...there's nothing...that could change just how this goes." And the last line of the song, included in the final chorus ("everyone shakes to the beat with a barrel down their throat") just confirms that everyone does what they're told when in an untenable situation, in this case at gunpoint.

Sounds violent and terrible for pop rock with good hooks-- but it's okay because this insane situation simply serves as the backdrop for the things that Wentz and Stump really want to discuss. So we move on to 2) The Music Industry.

This song also serves to communicate Wentz and Stump's dissatisfaction with certain aspects of their fame and the business that they find themselves in. Instead of a literal hostage situation, it becomes metaphorical. "This is a stick up/give us all your inspiration" is now the cry of the music industry, trying to bend Fall Out Boy to their whims and suck out all the creativity to capitalize and monetize it. The line "I've got the red carpet blues" perfectly encapsulates this other layer of interpretation, and causes the chorus to take on a new meaning.

"Don't get the wrong idea/We're gonna shoot you" now references the press and papparazzi taking pictures of the members of Fall Out Boy, whether they like it or not. The lines "And there's nothing in your head or pocket, throat or wallet/That could change just how this goes" is an affirmation that there's no amount of money, no opinions they can give, no songs they can create or sing to make the fame just go away. They're stuck with it, both the good and the bad. Moreover, they rely on the fame to make their living-- it's the "barrel down their throat," so they're forced to do whatever's necessary to please others, please the public, please their record label.

As I mentioned before, the line "You're appealing to emotions that I simply do not have" is still of paramount importance. The feeling that it gives me with this particular interpretation is of Wentz and Stump smiling and taking pictures when they're on the spot, but not really feeling that happiness internally.

Finally we get to probably the most important interpretation of these lyrics, 3) The Troubled Relationship. This version ties itself into the title of the song, It's Hard to Say "I Do" When I Don't, and we can see that at its core, the song is really about not wanting to commit to marriage-- Wentz views this as its own kind of hostage situation, caught between a life-long commitment that he doesn't want, or the death of the relationship. It's clear that he doesn't see this ending in holy matrimony; in this new light, the chorus can be re-examined. He feels like there's nothing that he can do, the relationship will be shot dead.

Yet he still has to make a decision-- and we can imagine the girl on the other side of the relationship arguing that she loves him, that their relationship needs to be heading towards a life together. His response? "You're appealing to emotions that I simply do not have." Cold! Even more so: the second verse, which really can't be explained via any of the other layers of interpretation. "When I said that I'd return to you I meant more like a relapse/Now and again I think "his and hers," "for better or worse"/But the only ring I want buried with me are the ones around my eyes". It's straightforward enough. Wentz sometimes thinks of being with this girl forever, but always comes to the conclusion that it's not something he wants. But how brutally honest is that? "The only ring I want buried with me are the ones around my eyes". I mean, I love it, but good lord, if I was that girl I would kick his ass. Still, even with these vehement refusals, we can't forget the final line, that "everyone shakes to the beat with a barrel down their throat". This presents at least the possibility that Wentz will agree to getting married when it finally comes down to it, even given the fact that he positions himself directly against it. Kind of a sad statement on making decisions in life, isn't it?

I hope you got something out of this today, but if not, don't fear-- I'll pick some better Fall Out Boy songs in the future. While this one is pretty good, there's a reason it was a b-side. It's not quite as catchy as some of their other work, and it really doesn't quite spotlight the great verbal gymnastic skills of the Stump/Wentz combo the way that I thought it would. We'll come back to these guys when the time is right. See you in seven.