| Irony discussion |
[Jun. 8th, 2007|10:24 am]
Walt Shitman's Bad Poets' Circle
|
There was a barroom debate over whether that song "Ironic" actually had ironic things in it. I could only remember two, and it seemed like irony to me. But let's go to the song:
An old man turned ninety-eight
He won the lottery and died the next day
It's a black fly in your Chardonnay
It's a death row pardon two minutes too late
Isn't it ironic ... don't you think
Well, I think it's 'cosmic irony'; it's not the sarcastic kind, but I'd allow it.
Chorus
It's like rain on your wedding day
this is ironic only to a culture which associates rain with gloom. So it's a bit insenstive to the Chinese, but it makes sense
It's a free ride when you've already paid
Hey, you can go to the Black Keys show next week for free! Don't buy tickets, ask me how!
It's the good advice that you just didn't take
I think this one's a bit more tenuous, but I get it, it's a song about how life has these sucky moments, and this fits in
Who would've thought ... it figures
Mr. Play It Safe was afraid to fly
He packed his suitcase and kissed his kids good-bye
He waited his whole damn life to take that flight
And as the plane crashed down he thought
'Well isn't this nice...'
And isn't it ironic ... don't you think
Textbook example of irony.
Repeat Chorus
Well life has a funny way of sneaking up on you
When you think everything's okay and everything's going right
And life has a funny way of helping you out when
You think everything's gone wrong and everything blows up
In your face
It's a traffic jam when you're already late
Not irony. It would have to be like, a bus ran over a guy directing traffic (to keep it flowing, eh?) and that caused a back up. Or if you thought the main way to get somewhere would be slow so you take a short cut and IT turns out to be jammed, while on the radio, the traffic guy says how smooth the main way is flowing. That's a little wordy for a song
It's a no-smoking sign on your cigarette break
Just walk farther down the parking lot, dummy,
It's like ten thousand spoons when all you need is a knife
stupid
It's meeting the man of my dreams
And then meeting his beautiful wife
it's more ironish than ironic, a stronger image would be "the man of my dreams, who really, really raped me."
And isn't it ironic... don't you think
A little too ironic... and yeah I really do think...
Repeat Chorus
Life has a funny way of sneaking up on you
Life has a funny, funny way of helping you out
Helping you out
So it looks like the last verse is the weakest, and what those Best Week Ever jokers must have focused on, Fox News style. |
|
groggy
okay