When Heroes Go Down

This song doesn't need much interpretation. It's about what happens to those we put on pedestals. The higher we set them above us, the harder and faster they seem to fall. And since all heroes are ultimately human (the "super" kind of heroes are all fictional), they all ultimately fail and fall.

Thomas Jefferson, Albert Einstein, Martin Luther King, Jr., even Gandhi... no matter how lauded and adulated, their biographers always seem to find the embarrassing skeletons behind the iconic facades. And when these skeletons (in the above examples, involving their relationships with women) come to light, well, as Vega says: "When heroes go down/ They go down fast."

The fall so quickly, there is no "time to/ Equivocate the past." That twenty five-cent word means "to cloud or obscure." A classic equivocation is: "Mistakes were made."

Like plummeting airplanes, falling heroes "land in flame." They are always, to others, at fault for their own downfall-- but to themselves, they are the victims of circumstance or conspiracy. Snap judgments are made, by the media and public, and "don't expect any slow and careful/ Settling of blame." They fell? Their fault.

So hold something back, Vegas advises, when you admire someone: "look out for the feet of clay." An interesting expression, from the Biblical Book of Daniel, this refers to a vision this prophet had of a particular king's society. He dreamed of a statue with a gold head, silver chest, bronze stomach, iron legs (note the decreasing worth of the metals on down)... and clay feet. This heavy statue (the kingdom) was built on a soft, unstable foundation (a rebellious peasant class) that would easily falter and bring his kingdom down.

Therefore, someone having "feet of clay" is fallible and will ultimately disappoint you, like the heroes Vega speaks of.

And what happens after they fall? There will be "no chance for last respects." No time to bury the reputationally dead with a proper funeral and last rites... before the public is on to the next hero on the next pedestal. "You feel the disappointment," but no one else is there to mourn your fallen hero.

Lastly, the "fall" coming with their being "revealed," then "you can't expect any kind of mercy/ On the battlefield." If someone's protective armor is compromised, their enemies will have at them relentlessly and remorselessly.

Vega herself is a celebrity. She has some experience being recognized while walking down the street and eating in cafes. And while she never has been the subject of tabloid scandal-mongering, she has had her most popular period, and now is-- and there is no shame in this-- less so. Perhaps another such period is in her future-- a song of hers could get recycled as a TV theme, or be sampled by Beyonce or something. There is no way to tell.

And Vega herself has, as have we all, admired others... and come to see their flaws. Perhaps seeing how celebrities fall-- or are torn down-- she is happier now that she has her family, her work, and her loyal following (ahem)... and that's all.

But maybe that's enough, or even better. After all, there isn't as much room to relax on a pedestal as there is on a porch swing.


Next Song: As Girls Go

As a Child

Psychologists, filmmakers, and software designers have, since 1970, spoken about the "Uncanny Valley." People who are clearly real have a high acceptance by humans, as do depictions of people that are clearly false, such as paintings, photographs, cartoons, and obviously mechanical robots.

In between these "peaks" of acceptance is a "valley" inhabited almost-but-not-quite human things that tend to set people on edge. Dolls, puppets, ventriloquism dummies, zombies, androids, vampires, taxidermied animals, and even clowns all seem to inhabit this so-called "uncanny valley" that leaves viewers with unease and sometimes even fear. Therefore, they are often employed in horror movies and Twilight Zone episodes.

Vega's song seems to be exploring this terrain. In the first two verses, we imagine ourselves "as a child" who has a "doll." So lifelike is this synthetic creation, "it seems to/ Have a life."

A child might also create a miniature world on the beach, in a sandbox, in a dollhouse, in a couch-cushion fort, with blocks, with a train set... or even just by drawing in the "dirt in the street." This space, in a child's imagination, "becomes a town."

This is an enormous amount of control and power, as much destructive as it was creative: "All the people" in Dirttown "depend on you/ Not to hurt them/ Or bang the stick down." Like the doll, the Dirttowners "seem to have a life."

This image seems to recall that of the Mark Twain short story "The Mysterious Stranger." At one point in an encounter between an angel named Satan (after his uncle, the original Satan) and some children, he shows them a town he had made of clay:

"...and while he talked he made a crowd of little men and women the size of your finger, and they went diligently to work and cleared and leveled off a space a couple of yards square in the grass and began to build a cunning little castle in it... five hundred of these toy people swarming briskly about and working diligently and wiping the sweat off their faces as natural as life... Two of the little workmen were quarreling, and in buzzing little bumblebee voices they were cursing and swearing at each other; now came blows and blood; then they locked themselves together in a life-and-death struggle. Satan reached out his hand and crushed the life out of them with his fingers, threw them away, wiped the red from his fingers on his handkerchief, and went on talking where he had left off."

This Satan doesn't make the people of dirt or hit them with a stick, but I believe the imagery and sentiment are largely the same. 

Now we arrive at the point of Vega's discourse: "As a child/ You see yourself." Aha! A child is, in some sense, also an almost-person (again, this explains their prevalence in horror movies). 

Developmental psychologists explain that first, babies see themselves as parts or extensions of their mothers; this is only fair, as they have been quite that for some time. Then they mature to the state of not-mother. They can only define themselves as individuals in opposition to their parents, and do so with "No!" and tantrums. Hopefully, they develop even further and begin to see themselves as whole and independent, not in relation to-- neither same-as nor different-from-- the other party.

"You wonder why/ You can't seem to move." Children are often uncoordinated. Their brains have to learn how to make their bodies do everything from walk to put food in their mouths. Then they have to master even more complex tasks, like using a crayon or scissors. As a result, they can sometimes "Feel like a thing." 

The Yiddish word "klutz" captures this nicely. While it has come to mean "a clumsy person," it originally meant "a block of wood"; a klutzy person is just as graceful.

The next lines point to the beginning of exploration of the wider world: "Hand on the doorknob... one foot on the sidewalk." First, we leave the room for the rest of the house. Then we leave the house for the rest of the world.

At first, the task seems overwhelming: "Too much to prove" for this wood-block of a child.

But, over time, and with repetition, "you learn to/ you learn to/ you learn to/ have a life."

And that, ultimately, is what differentiates the fully human from the denizens of the uncanny valley. The doll and the Dirttowners only "seem" to have a life. They do not, because they cannot learn. Even a talking doll can only say those phrases on its internal recording. The uncanny ones can repeat, but they cannot gain experience from this repetition.

A doll says its five phrases perfectly and seems to have a life. You say a million things. Some are repeated, but many are original, and very many are flawed. But from mistakes come growth. A doll cannot grow; it can only break.

Alexander Pope, the poet, took the Latin expression "to err is human" and contrasted it with "to forgive, divine." But maybe Pope's quote could take something from Descarte's, "I think, therefore I am."

Fused, they form one thought that neatly expresses our song's message: "I err, therefore I am human."

And so, maybe not divine. But not uncanny, either.

Next Song: Bad Wisdom

Some Journey

The most important word in this song is the first: "If." The song is largely speculation, followed by a return to reality "as it is." In this, the song echoes the structure of a sonnet— one set of circumstances, followed by a “volta,” a turn toward the opposite.

The speaker feels that if the conditions had been different— the setting, the lighting, the clothing, the entire atmosphere— romance would have bloomed between her and the one she is singing to. 

She imagines the two of the having met on a train speeding "eastbound." By the description of their clothes, they would have been heading toward the Orient. He would be wearing "silken robes," and she, a mere, sheer garment made of "smoke and fire/ for [him] to see through." Oh, my.

Or, what about a "darkened room" of some mysterious sort? She describes a room in which people "pass" but "do not stay," perhaps some sort of hotel. He would have "taken [her] upstairs" to, presumably, a bedroom... where who-knows-what would have happened when he "turned the lamplight low." 

Without them knowing each other, they could have shared a consequence-free tryst (or a few). Knowing her reality would never have had to be revealed, she could have indulged his fantasies, and have played his "little girl... wife... mistress... lady fair..." or even "woman of the road."

In any case, she would have them vanished, "disappeared like the snow," or he would have "never come back home to [her]." No morning-after consequences.

There is an emphasis on clothes— things you can disguise yourself with— and motion. Even the clothes are made of "smoke and fire... lace like foam from the sea," things that are formless and ever-moving and fleeting. Even in the "room," well, no one stays there, and in the upstairs room, she would simply vanish.

There is no stasis, no solidity, in the romantic world of her imagination. Also, very little light.

The train passes through a “black, sleeping” town. Other words and phrases also evoke darkness: “smoke,” “darkened,” “shadows,” “never see the day,” and “turn the lamplight low.”

Then the dreamer awakens to find the opposite is true. She is in a land of buildings, not trains. Of homes, not hotels: "We live in the city." And? "And everything stays in place."

In her reality, there is an “open sidewalk,” very public. “Well I know your face,” she says, cringing at the over-familiarity. (it's "well I know," as in "I know it well," not "Well, I know...") 

There is also an atmosphere of openness: “We talk and talk/ We tell the truth,” and disappointingly, “there are no shadows here.”

She wonders if he has had the same thoughts: “When I look into your eyes/ I wonder what might have been here.” (Yes, Vega rhymes “here” with itself. What can you do?)

And still she wonders, if— instead of the static, bright, too-honest city— they had met on some inky, hazy, sultry journey, with identities masked and mystery swirling … if…

The song ends with a question repeated throughout: “Where would we be now?” The key word here is “we.” She imagines them, if they had been able to meet with some “shadows” around, being able to maintain a relationship. Not here, in the blare and glare of the city, but some other “where.”

The journey could never end, of course. The “where” would have to keep changing, if the basis of the relationship is the lack of stability. They would have to stay on that train.

Still, it doesn’t sound like she’d mind that.

Next Song: The Queen and the Soldier