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You would be correct. But that's still hurting others.

@@dangshnizzle6929 yeah but people kept making me think it was homicide and I was confused!

The "grand gesture" JD often mentions is implying that the guy doesn't want to live if he can't be with the person at the door. By showing up with a gun, some part of you was supposed to take that as oddly romantic (it's ultimately not and everyone can agree on this I hope). I take the song now days as a fantasy playing in the driver's head as he's driving across the county line to the person they are trying to win back, which is how the song ends. You get to decide if the fantasy played out like it did in the narrators head.... or he got the cops called on his ass

@@dangshnizzle6929 oh the tone of the song makes me think it's 100% fantasy and dude is in a psych ward

Same

I read the narrator as suicidal as well. Even then dude, driving across states and putting that emotional burden on someone who has no choice is also all kinds of fucked up.

Exactly, I always read the narrator as suicidal

I think it's both tbh.

It can very well still be that way; the person in front of the narrator and their gun, however, does not need to be the one to intervene.

I still read it as a figurative gun... like he's in emotional distress and seeing the person he loves eases his pain... like fucking obviously that wasn't John Darnelle's intent but that's how I'm reading it damn it

I got the clip from this video at around 1:00:04 kzfaq.info/get/bejne/a5ihedmB3s-uY5c.html

@@jeffemerson60 thanks

Perfect lyric tbh

pathetic

I agree from the bottom of my heart. One of the greatest lines ever sung in a song. But I also get John's reluctance to play the song, now, that he so strongly disagrees with the narrator. It's a bummer, but I guess we gotta live with that…

@@ollipoppolli Also it was years after that relationship ended that I finally realized it was abusive, and not just like, tumultuous or whatever. And so it's fitting that I sang a song that I didn't realize was about an abusive relationship to someone who I didn't even realize was abusing me.

@@Minotauronabike I'm incredibly glad you're free from that relationship and I hope you're in a healthier place. I had a similar experience of realizing a past relationship had been abusive, years after the fact (It's funny- not haha funny -how we can't see what it is when we're in the middle of it). I'd always excused the lectures and berating as 'He just wants me to be happy and healthy. He has a shitty way of doing it, but it's okay because behind it is good intentions." We stayed friends quite for a while after we mutually broke up. Eventually I moved home, thousands of miles away and we talked but rarely saw each other. The last time I visited him he pushed me to do all these self-destructive behaviors (the same ones he berated me for when we were together!), and as I observed his interactions with other people I realized, VERY CLEARLY, that he didn't give a fuck about my health or happiness, or anyone else's. He only cared about himself, and he didn't care if people did things that were destructive, as long as he didn't have to be around for the fallout. That was the last time I talked to him. Thankfully I'm in a healthy, respectful, loving relationship now. I really do hope you're doing well, whether you're in a relationship or single. ❤️

I kinda think that's the misogynistic part of it tho? He's not there to kill her because he loves her, he's there to hurt himself to prove his love for her, how much he needs her. What he would do without her. It sounds romantic, but it's a toxic codependent pattern many get into because of ideas of love. It gets misogynistic when it's a man shouldering all of his emotional bagage onto the woman he's supposed to love. Men making women pay for the consequences of their own toxicity. I do think it has some of the most beautiful mg lines written though.

Okay not exactly. The You Wee Cool progression is 1-5-6-4 (D Em A G) This is 1-5sus-4 (D-Asus-G) Does that matter? No. No it doesn’t. They create the same vibe. But it’s not exactly the same

I'm sorry, but You must have mistaken this for another set. The show that this is clipped from (which is linked in the description) doesnt include that song.

@@jeffemerson60 sorry.

This was recorded at a charity event on 11-21-2016. I uploaded it here because every other upload I could find had around 2-3 minutes of other chatter before someone requested going to georgia.

thanks!

The insidious thing about misogyny is that it gets to women too, but it's still hurtful. As a young woman, my heart finds something "attractive" about the idea of being a carer, being the only one able to calm a guy, "save" him from himself or taming the beast he might be. But realistically, entering a relationship with the idea of saving the other one, or entering a relationship with the idea of being saved by the other makes for toxic relationships. The image of a girl smiling as she gently eases the gun from a guy's "two big hands" feels beautiful, but really it also makes for an incredibly traumatic event for the girl. But nevermind that, she is smiling.

@@Coeurlarme these are both good points, I think it's also valid for people to like the song- even do a cover of it- with a different interpretation of the song.