No Time to Cry

Got any interesting thoughts on a set of lyrics? Any that don't involve the word "indeed"? Find yourself struggling to decipher all those obtuse references Von makes? Read "1959 And All That" and still no clearer? Nope, us neither. Postcards found lying in a skip around the back of the Chemists can be found here... Don't say you weren't warned.
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kafka
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Since nobody's really saying anything... on to the lesser canon.

"It's just like Adam says; it's not so hard to understand" -- what's that all about, then? Given the proximity to "Just like Jesus never came," I'd assume it's a biblical allusion; as far as I'm aware, the only thing Adam really says anything in the Bible it's to blame Eve / the serpent for the fall.

So, what to read into that? For anybody with inside knowledge (however hazy it must by now be), did Claire talk the band into signing a record deal?

And how do we parse some of the other lines in this stanza? I've found the "just like always" lines a bit difficult, but overall it feels to me like Von is basically saying "what did you expect this record business deal to be like? Stop your whining and let's get to work." It is a conflicted lyric, mind you: the battle between "everything will be all right" and "some nights I still can't sleep" (although I suppose that might be due to the amphetamines), between the "I get frightened too" and the "I keep no time to cry".

My reading is that this is the point where Andrew says "ok, we knew this was going to be difficult--what did you expect? But now that we're doing it, let's do it." It feels a little bit like the Eldritch ethos, as I see it -- which is a large part of what makes him and the band so fascinating: the undercurrent of fear and uncertainty coupled with the will to move forward regardless.

OK, late night ramble over. What do you people think?
[repeat x40]
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markfiend
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I think the line "Just like Jesus never came" is important. Is it about living in a "fallen state"?

So yeah, I do wonder if it's about the deal with WEA.
The fundamental cause of the trouble is that in the modern world the stupid are cocksure while the intelligent are full of doubt.
—Bertrand Russell
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Being645
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I have come to the conclusion that this referred to being captured between concepts and that Adam was Adam Smith,
in the sense that economic orientation makes the world all right - just like Jesus never came ...
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markfiend
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I'd never thought of that!
The fundamental cause of the trouble is that in the modern world the stupid are cocksure while the intelligent are full of doubt.
—Bertrand Russell
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LyanvisAberrant
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Well, I think the "Everything will be alright" bit is about false hope or something of the sort. Just trying to reassure himself of something or other. useful
A man with a fictitious grin pondered the terrain in which he flooded with anguish, for this is England. The lion cannot be tamed, this is the game.
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stufarq
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LyanvisAberrant wrote:Well, I think the "Everything will be alright" bit is about false hope or something of the sort. Just trying to reassure himself of something or other. useful
Exactly. Hugging your knees in the darkness rpeating over and over again "Everything will be alright, everything will be alright, everything will be alright..."

I don't think it's about record deals or philosophy or religion or anything like that. It's a song about fear, a subject Von returned to in Arms. Both songs talk about the fear of fear itself.
Any more of that and we'll be round your front door with the quick-setting whitewash and the shaved monkey.
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Being645
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LyanvisAberrant wrote:Well, I think the "Everything will be alright" bit is about false hope or something of the sort. Just trying to reassure himself of something or other. useful
Oh hell, ever suffered from long-term insomnia?
When thoughts are running round your head and just won't stop circulating around - nothing, in effect ...

One day, there's gonna be silence ... that definitely is the last resort to throw all this "thinking" out of gear ...

plus, of course, changing one's day-time activities to some vitalising directions - and within all the s**t that will never be alright, of course ...

So, I for one, wouldn't call it "false hope" ... strugglin', rather ...
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stufarq
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Is the title a quote from anywhere? it occurred to me that it's mentioned in REM's Shiny Happy People and I wondered if they were referencing the Sisters or if there was a common origin.
Any more of that and we'll be round your front door with the quick-setting whitewash and the shaved monkey.
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eastmidswhizzkid
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i have ALWAYS found the song uplifting, especially during my own dark times and especially the "everything will be alright..." part of the song. i disagree that its "false hope" -when you are reassuring yourself hope is hope, regardless of how things eventually turn out. just the fact that you havent yet given up, laid down and died means you havent given up hope.

when i saw the sisters at leamington spa i was in the middle of a court battle to have access to my son. before the show one of the songs played through the p.a. was motorhead's rock roll (which my son Rocky is partly named for) which made me cry -part happy tears,part not. when the sisters played No Time To Cry -completely out of the blue, for the first time in decades- i felt like they were playing it for me, and the joy and hope that that gave me lasted until i eventually won the court case.

often a song's meaning is as much about the listener as the writer, regardless of the lyrics original meaning.
Well I was handsome and I was strong
And I knew the words to every song.
"Did my singing please you?"
"No! The words you sang were wrong!"
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