Last week during his interview on Nexus Radio, Stonebridge highlighted the fact that Europeans tend to focus on production and not so much on lyrics, which makes a lot of sense from the producer’s standpoint. It also makes a lot of sense from a listener’s perspective as well, most people do not pay attention to the lyrics of a song, unless the lyrics or the beat captures them in which case the other will follow. Arguably, it is the reason why many people refer to music as the soundtrack of their lives. Often times the lyrics are there to tell a story, but sometimes the lyrics are completely off and are filled with absurdity.
Not too long ago we were being slammed with songs with absurd lyrics. We saw this with Erika’s “Relations,” Eiffel 65’s “Blue,” The Bloodhound Gang’s “Bad Touch,” and more recently with AronChupa’s “Albatraoz.” Some of these songs are downright incomprehensible, but we can live with that because the choruses made sense (in most cases).
Then came along Mako with the song “Smoke filled room,” a song that goes from metaphor to literal, from possible to impossible, from first person to second person to third person and back, all just in the first verse.
“Isn’t it a little late
shouldn’t you fly away
little dove with cigarettes
Show ’em that you can hold your breath
I heard about a girl
Buried her dolls and lost her curls
Painted on lipstick red
Grew herself up and then she’d
Walk into a smoke filled room
Oh no one could keep their eyes off you
Have a little drink or two
Oh how could you be that girl I knew”
The story here goes from a dove that should fly away in first person, to a cigarette smoking metaphoric dove that should hold its breath in second person. We then jump to first person by describing the subject of the metaphor “a girl”. A girl who is coming of age by losing her dolls, her curls, discovering lipstick and wait for it…..”grew herself up” in third person. We can’t give someone the possession of “growing up,” something like this would make an English professor cringe. So on behalf of lyrical geeks everywhere: stop torturing us with your lyrics MAKO ! But this is art we’re talking about, and in the name of “poetic freedom” we might be able to overlook all of the lyrical flaws in “Smoke Filled Room” by Mako. This concludes our psycho-analysis of Mako’s “Smoke Filled Room.” Do you love it or hate it?
Mako is an electronic duo on the rise. “Smoke filled Room” is currently impacting Nexus Radio. Take a listen and give us your feedback in comment section:
