Little Red Bird
what's your take on the meaning behind this beautiful song?
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i duno, but its simple & beautiful and def one of my favorites. i listen to it alot.
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i think its just a simple song about the joys and evil in the world and how weird it is that above all the evil are beautiful things, like little red birds
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'tis a nice little ditty.
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"but, Daddy don't you see how good i am at catching crumbs?" great tune. i too would like to know the meaning behind this little 'ditty.'
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I think red birds symbolize hope. I think it's just about having hope that things will get better.
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I really like this song. I like the lyrics a lot too
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"Guns and Gods, and Little Red Birds"
The 3 themes that Dave writes about the most. I love this song, and would love to hear it in E1 slots on the second leg. |
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I'm sorry but I think the song is terrible. It's my least favorite of them all.
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I love it but i don't listen to it much...
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It's just a nice little sweet song. |
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I love the weird metronome/click track sound in the background. The "1" is displaced to the actual "2" of each bar. Grab your guitar and you metronome and try playing this song that way, it's ridiculously fun.
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The clicking reminds me of 'Blackbird' by the Beatles
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My fav. of the bonus songs.
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I never got into LRB. I'm not a fan (generally) of super-falsetto Dave, so maybe I'm biased.
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i like it but i dont get the love affair with it..its an alright song, kinda boring
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I really enjoy this song. It's more of a dave solo song though, imo.
I've always thought there was a pretty obvious political message there. (no political bent on my part here, just interpreting what I hear) Seems like he was just chastising the war. "A comfort to count the battles won after the war is lost." The general custer reference seemed to be comparing him to gw bush and his stubborness regarding the war. red=republicans, so I think he's somehow belittling the republican party. Heck, you can even interpret it such that he was saying that gw has a little pp! |
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The song is about looking at the good parts of disappointment. Guns, Gods, Little Red Birds is Dave relating the whole world together in that it happens to all of us. The little guy, the guy with power, and gods.
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hmm. i didn't think about the possible political implications before, but that makes a lot of sense to me.
looking at the good parts of dissapointment doesn't work for me as much. of course this is just my interpretation, but it seems to me like he's talking about how desperately defensive people can be when they are lazy or have made a mistake. the little bird defends his laziness of not getting a job by saying he is good at catching crumbs. the failed general defends his mistakes by gathering the little, worthless victories of battles around him. god would have a troubled expression at people not owning up to their responsibilities. sorry to be such a downer, but with an ending like "if god had an honest face, a troubled expression would be watching the human race," i don't see how he can be saying anything about the good parts of dissapointment. it seems more like he's commenting on false hope. and i don't think "guns" is referencing "the guy with power"...more like guys who think they have power. general custer did lose to sitting bull, after all. |
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I think this tune is definitely an homage to the Beatles/Paul McCartney. Beyond the Blackbird-esque click track, everything about this song just screams McCartney. The melody, the guitar lines, even the lyrics.
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It's Machead! :D
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Here's my take--Like McCartney's "Blackbird," a very meaningful song about the struggles of an African-American woman in the Deep South before and during the Civil Rights movement disguised as a simple, beautiful ditty, Dave's "Little Red Bird," although slightly more straightforward than "Blackbird," is also a very meaningful song within a simple, beautiful ditty.
The entire song, from beginning to end, is a look at the plight of the Native Americans during the expansion and rise of the United States and was purposely written to parallel McCartney's "Blackbird." The similarities between the songs are too numerous to be accidental, from the use of an acoustic guitar and click track to the use of "bird" in the title and an instrumental bridge. The subject in the "Little Red Bird" and “Blackbird” are different (Native Americans and not an African-American women), but the topics are the same (the struggles of a minority population in the United States). Creating an homage to "Blackbird" is no easy task, but Dave pulled it off masterfully. In my opinion, "Little Red Bird" is one of Dave's best efforts as a songwriter in recent years. "Little Red Bird" opens with the lines, "Little Red Bird, under a chair, waiting for the crumbs to fall, Daddy said get a job, but don't you see Daddy how good I am at catching crumbs." Throughout the song, when Dave uses the phrase, “Little Red Bird,” he’s referring specifically to Native Americans. Beginning in the 1800s, Native Americans were forced to "wait for crumbs to fall" because their way of life, for the most part, was systematically being destroyed by an expanding United States. "Daddy said get a job" is likely a reference to the US government, in that Americans expected Native Americans to give up the way of life they had know for thousands of years for the way of life Americans were creating. “Little Red Bird’s” response to this request—“but don’t you see Daddy how good I am at catching crumbs”—is the Native American’s refusal to take up the new way of life. Rightly so, the Native American would rather stay out of American society and just catch the “crumbs” that come his or her way. The second verse, “General Custer it’s said, overestimated his abilities to win, Sitting Bull turned the table on him, a comfort to count the battles won after the war is lost,” is a self-explanatory and it enables the listener to understand what Dave was singing about in the first verse and the refrain. The second verse tells us how “Little Red Bird” found himself “under a chair, waiting for the crumbs to fall” because we learn that “Little Red Bird” lost the war. The United States was successful in its efforts to displace and move Native Americans to reservations. Sitting Bull’s victory against General Custer was a lone triumph in an otherwise unwinnable war for the Native Americans. The third verse, “If there was a place, hidden in the stars, reflected on heaven's graces, if God had an honest face, a troubled expression would be watching the human race,” is a reference to Dave’s belief that what happened to the Native Americans in the United States is an atrocity. If God was watching, he would be troubled (rightly) by the actions of the United States. "Guns and Gods and Little Red Birds” is used throughout the song as a refrain. Dave’s use of the word gun refers to how the United States was able to win the war. |
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You get an A -. I had to take off for some punctuation. |
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