R.E.M. – Bittersweet Me (Song of the Week)
This week’s song is “Bittersweet Me” by R.E.M. I heard this song a couple of days ago and it’s been stuck in my head since. It was the second single from the band’s tenth studio album, New Adventures in Hi-Fi, released in 1996. It was also the last album that featured drummer Bill Berry. The band has never played it live either.
The song itself is quite beautiful. It opens with simple and quit guitars with great lyrics by Stipe. It then picks up during the chorus and gets stuck in your head rather quickly. Right now, it’s one of my favorite R.E.M. songs.
Here are the awesome lyrics: I move across, innocence lost
All flashing pulsar
I move across the earth in my new pattern shirt
I pass satellites
“You’re so bitter,” your complaint
I can’t get you anything.
I don’t know who you’re livin for
I don’t you at all anymore.
I’d sooner chew my leg off,
Than be trapped in this.
How easy you think of all of this as bittersweet me
I can’t taste it
I’m tired and naked.
I don’t know what I’m hungry for
I don’t know what I want anymore
I move across, candy floss
I move like a tank
I move across the room
With a heart full of gloom
I’m stronger than you think.
Oh my peer,
Your veneer is wearing thin and cracking.
The surface and forms underneath,
Underneath is lacking.
I’d sooner chew my leg off,
Than be trapped in this.
How easy you think of all of this as bittersweet me
I couldn’t taste it.
I’m tired and naked.
I don’t know what I’m hungry for.
I don’t know what I want anymore.
You move across, innocence lost,
All static and desire,
You’re blue in the face from navel gaze,
You set yourself on fire.
You strip down and lay yourself out,
I know you can’t fake it,
But are you tire and naked?
Are you tire and naked?
I’d sooner chew my leg off,
Than be trapped in this.
How easy you think of all of this as bittersweet me
I couldn’t taste it
I’m tired and naked.
I don’t know what I’m hungry for.
I don’t know what I want anymore.
The video was similar to an Italian movie entitled Stanco E Nudo, which in English means “Tired and Naked”.
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