"I Want to Wrap My Arms Around Paris"

I'm not impressed by this song. Morrissey invokes Paris, the "City Of Love", and one would think that would offer an abundance of inspiration for some decent lyrics. But what we get is the chorus repeated several times, with refrences to "stone" and "steel", which could be ANY city.

I know what apologists are going to say: but you can say alot with a little...Morrissey doesn't have to go deep anymore with his lyrics...it's about the voice and music now etc. The truth is though, that this song is profoundly underwhelming to me, and while the music is good enough, Morrissey's lyrics don't do it for me.


I agree with this... I would like to hear a bit more to this song... another verse, perhaps. Right now it feels like chorus bridge chorus bridge bridge or vice versa or something like that. I want more meat. Sorry, Moz, pick up the pencil and fill it out a bit more. We shouldn't have to know your whole backstory to get this one. Pretty though it is.
 
I agree with this... I would like to hear a bit more to this song... another verse, perhaps. Right now it feels like chorus bridge chorus bridge bridge or vice versa or something like that. I want more meat. Sorry, Moz, pick up the pencil and fill it out a bit more. We shouldn't have to know your whole backstory to get this one. Pretty though it is.

Why do you think a song has to follow a certain formula?
 
Why do you think a song has to follow a certain formula?

Are you serious? Try telling that to Morrissey, who's been following the verse, bridge, chorus regime for a very long time now (with very few exceptions). Of course this isn't really the point is it, because this is just a poor song regardless, with people over eager to praise it vehemently in an attempt to overcompensate for that fact. Boz does a good job with the music (as good as he did on "Grow Up", but with the added addition of an expert change of pace) and then Morrissey fluffs the lyrics.

I said it before and I'll say it again: when you take the sentiments of both "Grow Up" and "Paris", and look at the meaning behind the lyrics, you have some very interesting ideas, but Morrissey is being incredibly lazy with his writing. ROTT brought emotional closure to the troubled artist, and now he's gone back to being troubled, doesn't work does it? Hence, the dissapointing new material.

Look, I love Morrissey. But if this is a sign of how the new album is going to sound, than I don't think we're in for anything too great.
 
i actually love this new song. but it just seems too short. perhaps adding an outro might be best instead of ending it on "yes you've made yourself very plain"? well thats what I think at least IMHO
 
Are you serious? Try telling that to Morrissey, who's been following the verse, bridge, chorus regime for a very long time now (with very few exceptions). Of course this isn't really the point is it, because this is just a poor song regardless, with people over eager to praise it vehemently in an attempt to overcompensate for that fact. Boz does a good job with the music (as good as he did on "Grow Up", but with the added addition of an expert change of pace) and then Morrissey fluffs the lyrics.

I said it before and I'll say it again: when you take the sentiments of both "Grow Up" and "Paris", and look at the meaning behind the lyrics, you have some very interesting ideas, but Morrissey is being incredibly lazy with his writing. ROTT brought emotional closure to the troubled artist, and now he's gone back to being troubled, doesn't work does it? Hence, the disapointing new material.

Look, I love Morrissey. But if this is a sign of how the new album is going to sound, than I don't think we're in for anything too great.

Well put.
The line "you've made yourself plain/very plain" is good as it can be taken
it's clear what you mean
or
Now I see you for what you are, as a plain/unappealing person, I no longer have illusions. There is clearly potential here.

But the rest doesn't ring true. It may be based on the end of a relationship but the effect is not to inspire sympathy for the unfortunate forlorn subject, but impatience at their self pitying " the only romance/love for me now is this stone and steel." Was "Paris" chosen because of it's romantic reputation or because the two syllables fit the line better?
Or has he recently acquired a sculpture of the mythical Paris?

But then a few duff songs is not the end of the world. He looks mighty tired to me after all this touring and a good rest or change of environment could do wonders for personal happiness and creative output.

Finally, if finding lasting peace and happiness in his life means he never feels the need to write another song - well I won't complain.
 
or maybe Paris is a place he chose to throw himself into so he could forget the world.

...or, at least, that's the point i'd emphasize if i were the author of said song....
 
I love the lyrics, I adore the music. I think it's a great song and I can't wait to hear a studio version. If you don't like that, then f*** you :D
 
Are you serious? Try telling that to Morrissey, who's been following the verse, bridge, chorus regime for a very long time now (with very few exceptions). Of course this isn't really the point is it, because this is just a poor song regardless, with people over eager to praise it vehemently in an attempt to overcompensate for that fact. Boz does a good job with the music (as good as he did on "Grow Up", but with the added addition of an expert change of pace) and then Morrissey fluffs the lyrics.

I said it before and I'll say it again: when you take the sentiments of both "Grow Up" and "Paris", and look at the meaning behind the lyrics, you have some very interesting ideas, but Morrissey is being incredibly lazy with his writing. ROTT brought emotional closure to the troubled artist, and now he's gone back to being troubled, doesn't work does it? Hence, the dissapointing new material.

Look, I love Morrissey. But if this is a sign of how the new album is going to sound, than I don't think we're in for anything too great.

I somewhat agree with this. While I like all three of the new songs, only "Grow Up" stands out for me as a performance, and I generally tend to agree with the man's own assessment that he's not sure they're songs so much as "showers of panic."

Moz has done a couple of emotional-closure albums (I think Vauxhall could also lay a claim) and bounced back troubled again - so I don't agree that there's no real room for angst after ROTT, but it's true that the verse-chorus-verse is quite ironclad and that these songs are mostly elaborations on things he's done better already (Dear God Please Help Me, You Knew I Couldn't Last, The Never Played Symphonies).

Which is nice, in its way; I appreciate the diary-like honesty of continuing to write on these themes after they've been artistically "done." And they're not hideously done: "All You Need Is Me" at least has a different take from previous songs about fans vs. "real" relationships, and "Paris" expresses a sentiment that he's spoken about many times but never written about explicitly - hence it probably plays/will play better to non-fans.

Perhaps I'll come down harder on these songs if the next album comes out and they're featured very prominently, and talked up as Moz' new favorite examples of the songwriter's art. Right now, I'm okay with them, but not overjoyed. I think they feel very much as though they were written on the road and on the fly, and that whether they work an album will depend heavily on track listing, production and qualities of the other songs.





Oh, and a digression on "All You Need Is Me," while I'm talking about that song and fan relationships - I think it's possible that the title is quoted/lifted from Kristeen Young's "No Other God." It'd be an interesting sample if this is true - "No Other God" applies the First Commandment to a romantic relationship, in a tongue-in-cheek way that doesn't completely come through from reading the lyric, and in a way that also echoes Moz' relationship with many of his fans - the narrator encourages and assists the subject, and is plainly somewhat good for him, but she's quite intense about it and demands things very much on her terms.

To quote the bridge, final verse and chorus:

All you need (all you need, all you need) is me
Lucky you (lucky you, lucky you), you found me
What'd you do, what'd you say, what'd you feel, before me?
And my love is so, oh, oh...you'll wanna kill your friends.

I've seen you labour for your dreams.
Then, comatose when they're unseen.
And sometimes God is silent, too,
but God can't fill you like I do.

He better cut it out
You better cut Him out
You better cut Him off
You'll have no other God before me.


Anyway, if Moz made that steal (and I'm sorry to point out Kristeen all the time, but if he's really that into her, I think an assumption of Moz steals is fair game), it'd add a layer to the song - the hero as difficult muse to the fan, and a second underlining to the idea of fan and hero actually having a mutual and emotionally complex relationship. The reference is obscure, though (I'm not sure how many people own X who aren't fairly die-hard Kristeen fans; it's only available on import) so I doubt it's a thing he meant people to read in semi-subconsciously, like "loves and hates and passions just like mine."
 
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Anyway, if Moz made that steal (and I'm sorry to point out Kristeen all the time, but if he's really that into her, I think an assumption of Moz steals is fair game), it'd add a layer to the song - the hero as difficult muse to the fan, and a second underlining to the idea of fan and hero actually having a mutual and emotionally complex relationship.

Very interesting. You may be right. I had assumed it was a snarky play on The Beatles' "All You Need Is Love".
 
[...] if finding lasting peace and happiness in his life means he never feels the need to write another song - well I won't complain.

i'm with you, on this
 
I`m sure I fall into an insane category of fan that will buy whatever he does simply because its him and I`ve loved him virtually all my life.And i don`t want to pass judgement on something that hasn`t been properly released and will probably be altered as most songs change .Much the same way novelists develope stories and they are edited or added to.If you are looking for Morrissey from the time of Now My Heart is Full for example he probably doesn`t exist anymore.He won`t ever have the commercial success he probably craves because the UK music press have never understood him.And thank God for that.We wouldn`t want him turning into Robbie Williams.Lets all wait and see.But the day(and it will NEVER come) that i come on here to belittle anything he does is the day when they put me in my coffin.:D
 
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I wish he would quit worrying about radio airplay. Radio is dead. Dead, dead, dead. The only radio station I ever listen to is WXRT in Chicago and my local NPR- and my XM radio stations. XRT plays what it wants, and it's always way down there in ratings.

The internet and iTunes and iPods have killed radio- no, wait. ClearChannel did that. But you have to finance all those shiny new temples somehow.
 
Very interesting. You may be right. I had assumed it was a snarky play on The Beatles' "All You Need Is Love".

That hadn't occurred to me (which says things about my priorities) but I find it pretty plausible. Maybe both of them took from there, or some combination of the two.
 
He won`t ever have the commercial success he probably craves because the UK music press have never understood him.And thank God for that.We wouldn`t want him turning into Robbie Williams.Lets all wait and see.But the day(and it will NEVER come) that i come on here to belittle anything he does is the day when they put me in my coffin.:D

why is it always robbie williams?
 
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