Lyrics To Top Three Hit Tracks
The Living End songs have walked the path once paved by acts like The Clash and Green Day in which a strong social message is an upbeat, fun song. Let´s look at three of their main hits lyrics (there are many, many more).
PRISONER OF SOCIETY
Well we don’t need no one to tell us what to do
Oh yes we’re on our own
And there’s nothing you can do
So we don’t need no one like you
To tell us what to do
We don’t refer to the past
When showing what we’ve done
Our generation gap
Means the war is never won
The past is in your head
THE FUTURE’S IN OUR HANDS!
Cos I’m a brat
And I know everything
And I talk back
Cos I’m not listening
To anything you say
And if you count to 3 (one, two, three)
You’ll see it’s no emergency
You’ll see I’m not the enemy
Just a Prisoner of Society
This lyric belongs to the highest-selling single in Australia for its decade and is a statement of protest. The teenage angst, the misunderstanding, and the feeling of being caught in society´s old rules that no longer apply are very legit. I remember listening to it for the first time and being blown away by it screaming that I was a prisoner of society too!
WAKE UP
I’ve been buried in the sand,
I’ve come down with no place to land
I don’t need you to understand it’s not what I had planned
All the hunger, all the yearning
With the lifeline, that you’re burning
Poison lessons that you’re learning
The road ahead is turning
Suicidal education (wake up, wake up)
It got sold to our generation (wake up, wake up)
Wake up to the, manipulation (wake up, wake up)
Wake up to the situation (wake up, wake up)
Suicidal education (wake up)
An obvious and robust statement about the hidden curriculum of education and much like Pink Floyd´s “The Wall” it warns the world about what kind of individual we are trying to form by sending our children to school. I think this lyric is especially up to date nowadays with all the Ritalin being prescribed to adolescents and young children with ADD.
WHITE NOISE
All that I’m hearing from you
Is White Noise (White Noise)
White Noise (White Noise)
If looks could kill
I’d be in trouble right now
Time stands still
When you’re around
Well, I gave you all my time,
And you gave me all your lies.
And you’ve just come around
to say goodbye.
Now here we stand
With our hearts in our hands
Squeezing out all the life
All that I hear
Is a message, unclear
What else is there to decide?
All that I’m hearing from you
Is White Noise (White Noise)
White Noise (White Noise)
You promised me your soul
But then left me in the cold
No warning and without a reason
You’re placing yourself
in a world of mistrust,
Making excuses
it’s not you, it’s us.
But how can something unspoken
seem so loud.
And now
The operator comes on the line
Says hurry up man
‘cos you aren’t got much time
White Noise
White Noise
All that I’m hearing from you
Is White Noise
All that I’m hearing from you
Is White Noise
White Noise
I must say there´s something magnetic between me and this song. I´m a die-hard fan of the early records, but I was always blown away by this fantastic tune. The White Noise concept is completely awesome because it´s based on randomness and it is usually present where there´s absence of other sound forms (think about the “rainy screen” of a TV with no signal). The sentence “How can something unspoken seem so loud” is amazing and to me, it applies directly to those relationships in which everything is already said, but you live it every day again. White noise between two people is a fantastic concept.
Did I say already I love this band? Well, I do.
