Lyrics: Beyoncé's "Radio" vs. Bill's "I of the Mourning"

[topleybird]

Poetry discussion corner!

Here's Beyoncé's "Radio" off her latest, "I Am…Sasha Fierce" (although she only gets partial writing credit on it, we will pretend for the sake of a simpler discussion that she is the sole author):

I be on the hotline like erday.
Making sure the DJ know what I want him to play.
You know I got my top back and my beat loud.
Rocking my stunna shades and turning up my radio.
Turn up the radio.

I think I'm in love with my radio.
Cause it never lets me down.
And I fall in love with my stereo.
Whenever I hear the sound.
Whenever I hear the sound.
Whenever I hear the sound.

He's the only one they ever allowed to hang out in my room.
With the door closed, we'd be alone.
And mama never freaked out when she heard it go boom.
Cause she knew we were in the zone.

Hold him in my arms and look out of my window.
Under the moonlight.
And he be keeping me calm so I never let him go.
He's got a place in my heart.

I think I'm in love with my radio.
Cause it never lets me down.
And I fall in love with my stereo.
Whenever I hear the sound.
Whenever I hear the sound.
Whenever I hear the sound.

When I get into my car I turn it up, up.
And then I hear vibrations all up in my trunk, unk.
And the baseline be rattling through my seats, eats.
And then that crazy feeling starts happening, ing, oh.

I get butterflies when I hear the DJ.
Playing the stuff I like.
And I fall deeper in love with every song that he plays.
He's got a place in my heart.

I think I'm in love with my radio.
Cause it never lets me down.
And I fall in love with my stereo.
Whenever I hear the sound.
Whenever I hear the sound.
Whenever I hear the sound.

I be on the hotline like erday.
Making sure the DJ know what I want him to play.
You know I got my top back and my beat loud.
Rocking my stunna shades and turning up my radio.
Turn up the radio.

I think I'm in love with my radio.
Cause it never lets me down.
And I fall in love with my stereo.
Whenever I hear the sound.
Whenever I hear the sound.
Whenever I hear the sound.

And here's Bill's "I of the Mourning" off his latest (what?), "Machina: The Machines of God":

Radio, play my favorite song
Radio, radio
Radio, I'm alone
Radio
Radio, please don't go
Radio

I peer through curtains on empty streets
Behind a wall of caller ID
No one's out there
To hear if I care
About the troubles in the air

As I of the mourning now come
Pick up where my thoughts left off
Cause I'm home to die on my own

As my radio plays my favorite song
Radio, radio
Radio, don't you know
Radio, radio
Radio, I'm alone

I've blown the dust off my guitars
In the attic with the stars
I read your letters to feel better
My tears upon the fading ink

Cause I of the mourning now come
Pick up where my thoughts left off
Cause I'm home to die on my own

As my radio plays my favorite song
Radio, radio
Radio, I'm alone
Radio, radio
Radio, please don't go

I sit in the dark light
To wait for ghost night
To bring the past alive
To make a toast to life
Cause I have survived

What is it you want
What is it you want to change
What is it you want
What is it you want to change
What is it you want to change

Radio, radio, radio, radio
Radio, radio, radio, radio
Radio, radio, radio, radio

What is it you want
What is it you want to change
What is it you want
What is it you want to change
What is it you want to change

Possible questions for discussion (these are suggestions only; feel free to focus on other, still relevant, ideas):

1. What does the radio signify for each singer? Could it be the same for the both of them?
2. Why does each singer cling to the radio? What can we surmise about their lives and the world around them, based on this affection for the radio and other clues in the songs?
3. Both singers address or imagine a sort of relationship with their radio, a communication device that transmits but does not receive input from the listener. How does Beyoncé get around this limitation? Does Bill?

[CrabbMan]

Are you a ninth grade English teacher?

[T&T]

just a ninth grade teachers pet.

[pineapple*soul]

this thread has my approval

gold star!

[pale_princess]

good thread! i'll have to think about this before submitting my answers!

[topleybird]

Originally Posted by CrabbMan

Are you a ninth grade English teacher?

More like I'm setting the level of discourse according to my opinion of you



Thank you pale_princess; a little thought is all I'd hoped for and I eagerly await your response

[TheMilstead]

I stopped taking reading comprehension tests when I finished school, thanks.

[stumpycat]

I always wondered why schools use tests of reading comprehension so extensively...it's not exactly a skill that can be explicitly taught by going to school anyway. Schools can really only teach literacy...the rest is an implicit skill one may develop themselves through experience and/or is also a matter of innate intelligence. Comprehension can in part be subjective as well. I recall a really fucking dense coach/teacher that taught "honors" high school English. What a meat head. We had to read Macbeth and this guy created a test containing multiple choice questions of interpretation...based on his interpretation. He wouldn't even correct the plainly fact-based questions he fucked up because of the grading key. WTF. I complained of his incompetence to the drama teacher, who thankfully sided with my view of things. It was a morale victory.

[CrabbMan]

Hmm, upon a more careful reading, I think I really don't get what Billy is singing about. I'm gonna say the radio somehow represents his discontent with the present. For Beyonce, radio is equated to the joyful, easy side of love & relationships: the fun and excitement, unburdened by the inevitable imperfections in real people.

[Joe]

beyonce likes her radio more than people because it's more reliable.

bill seeks the aproval of the radio audience

beyonce likes her radio because she has bad taste in music

bill likes hie radio because he is afraid of people ( at least in the song)


beyonce likes feeling her radio vibrate.

bill does not interact in any silly way with his radio./

[Rairun]

Beyonce's lyrics are kind of bad. The character is too inconsistent, and not in a "people are complex and contradictory" sort of way. She can't seem to decide whether she is a self-sufficient person who loves her radio or a lonely individual who's comforted by it.

B0lly's radio is the only source of solace to an isolated person. It lets him know that there is a whole world out there to be discovered, a life to be lived. It's what gives him the strength to try and change things.

[Shallowed]

Originally Posted by mojo jojo

beyonce likes feeling her radio vibrate.

Yes.

When I get into my car I turn it up, up.
And then I hear vibrations all up in my trunk, unk.

[Ugly]

Beyonce is listening to the radio and she likes it cause she digs on the tunes. Billy is suicidal but he's hearing something in the radio that's giving him hope and bringing him back from the brink. The tempo of the song builds as it goes on to drive home that point. (The "what is it you want to change" is a reference to an unmentioned third party. Is Billy hearing something in the radio song that's asking them that, or is the third party - God, Satan, Voices in his head, whatever - asking that of Billy) I don't know how the Beyonce song tempo works into her tune thematically. I'm assuming it's fairly bouncy and straighforward the entire time with little change. Cause her radio is fun and cool. Billy's radio is giving him a reason to live.

[Springbridge]

Beyonce's lyrics are so ridiculous and awful it's unbelievable. Not only is half of it not even proper English, her words are so straight forward and significantly dumbed down that it sounds like her music is mainly trying to appeal to a special needs class at an all girl's Junior High School.

[stumpycat]

Cause her radio is fun and cool. Billy's radio is giving him a reason to live.

...and my radio is neither.
Beyonce must have some special ass radio.
Turning on my radio gives me a reason to die.

[Ugly]

You gotta find the right pre-sets. The all-jazz station is pretty neat.

[slunken]

i can never turn coast-to-coast up enough to make my trunk rattle

[topleybird]

Originally Posted by Ugly

I don't know how the Beyonce song tempo works into her tune thematically. I'm assuming it's fairly bouncy and straighforward the entire time with little change.

It's worth listening to if you can find it; she has an interesting vocal delivery throughout. I assume it's meant to sound like a somewhat vapid teen girl but to me it sounds, well, a little unstable. And when it gets to the stanza "When I get into my car..." it sounds to me like she's completely falling apart.

I guess the sections of lyrics I find most interesting in "Radio" are:

"I think I'm in love with my radio 'cause it never lets me down"
"And he be keeping me calm so I never let him go"
"And then that crazy feeling starts happening"

[IEatMyFeces]

Maybe he's a convicted rapist. Immediate ban. Or maybe...

[topleybird]

Thank you IEatMyFeces, that means a lot to me