"Lyrics Explained" Explained

There are so many timeless, inventive, and genius works of art being created everyday, that sometimes a few of them fall through the cracks. My goal here is to help out everyone who doesn't have time to delve deeply into the meaning of the lyrics of todays greatest artistic expressions: songs. As with any art form, the beauty is in the layers. I hope to peel away some of the layers, read between the lines, piece the puzzle together, and use as many cliches as possible along the way. So please to enjoy the meanings as I see them of some of the best songs of our time.

Friday, October 1, 2010

Teenage Dream by Katy Perry

First impressions: someone thinks this is pretty. Eek. The guy obviously has some thick prescription glasses that he recently lost.

He also thinks that she's funny when she gets the punchline wrong. In other words, he is laughing at her, not with her. He also tells her she is pretty when she is not. And, for these niceties which one would give to his/her grandparents, she lets her "walls" down [wink wink]. Who knew she was so easy? Oh wait...

Apparently the object of her affection saved her life, literally. He brought her back to life, much like Dr Frankenstein. And what does she give in return for this unspeakably valuable gift? She's his valentine and every February she gives him that sweet sweet zombie loving. Her cold hands on his body. Her moans are now of pleasure, not the mundane undead brain cravings that usually plague his life. It's more than he could ever have hoped for. Fembots have nothing on Zombielovers.

She then says "you and I will be young forever." The wording is important, as she is forcing him to be young. And eternal youth can mean only one thing in this case: she wants to make him an undead as well. She wants to "go all the way," and make him undead too. She says she wants to "dance until we die." This seems contradictory with the young forever thing, but it's not. She wants to "dance with him" until he becomes undead like her, and they will be young forever together.

She makes a thinly veiled reference to her plans to runaway with him while he sleeps and dreams like a teenager (Teenage Dreams). She wants to make him undead and go past the point of no retrurn, or "never look back" if you will. I presume her love interest is the only man capable of bringing people back to life, so if he is undead as well it will be impossible for him to return to human form. Misery loves company, and she wants someone to spend all eternity with. But you may be wondering "how does she turn the man who brought her back to life into a fellow zombie?"

Luckily, in the next verse she explains her detailed plan about how she will make him undead. She plans to take him to Cali(fornia), get him drunk on the beach, bring him to a motel, make a fort out of sheets to disguise her misdoings from passersby, and then the evil begins. She tempts by letting him put his hands on her thighs, which are barely covered by skin tight jeans. She leaves off the end of her plan, but we can assume that her lover wakes up with a massive headache, some cold skin, and no heartbeat. Plus, Katy Perry's not going to be wearing any makeup. Do we need a reminder of how bad that is?

No comments:

Post a Comment