Tuesday, November 20, 2012

Comparison Essay: "Apartment" & "The Old Apartment"

Matthew Litchfield
November 20, 2012
 A  Poetry of Song

The feeling of nostalgia is often captures most accurately in music. In the case of “Apartment” (Young The Giant), and “The Old Apartment” (Bare Naked Ladies), nostalgia is caught in their respective filters of sadness and anger.
Both songs deal with the dark emotions surrounding buried memories in old apartments. They give a sense of defeat and mourning over failed relationships through their dejected imagery and somber diction. There is a resonance between the songs; in “Apartment” the narrator “hide[s] in a raincoat when things are falling apart,” and in “The Old Apartment” the narrator says there are “broken hearts and broken bones.”  These two passages demonstrate the hurt one can feel when they’re displaced from familiarity through their respective use of figurative emotional and physical brokenness.
Noteworthy are the tonal difference between the two songs. “The Old Apartment” talks about the narrator’s anger, describing his emotions through his actions, as when he “tore the phone out of the wall.” Conversely, “Apartment” shows the narrator’s ‘exile’ from his apartment, and makes use of subtle symbolism of rain to indicate the end of an era. Where “The Old Apartment” expresses the narrator’s anger at his former partner, “Apartment” describes the narrator’s sadness that his relationship has ended.
“Apartment” and “The Old Apartment” share a room filled with painful memories and emotions. The narrators tell their stories and characterize themselves as sad or angry (respectively) by describing how they interact with and remember their old apartments. The old conflicts of their now ended relationships are palpable in their acts of leaving and breaking into these places of their past.


Lyrics and Videos Below the Break!



“Apartment”
Young the Giant



After leaving my apartment
I feel this cold inside me
It howls all through the market
It calls your name

On my way to your apartment
I write for fear of silence
You carved a boat to sell my shadow
Now I walk alone

I hit the sidewalk and this is how it starts
Hide in a raincoat when things are falling apart

After leaving your apartment

I hear the coast by nightfall
So sure to keep you dreaming
You understood
Oh, I know you understood
Yes sir, it shows I was no good

I hit the sidewalk and this is how it starts
Hide in a raincoat when things are falling apart
Cause sooner or later this is bound to stop
Come on, let's savor what we're falling over

After leaving your apartment
I hear the coast...



“The Old Apartment”
Bare Naked Ladies



Broke into the old apartment
This is where we used to live
Broken glass, broke and hungry
Broken hearts and broken bones
This is where we used to live

Why did you paint the walls?
Why did you clean the floor?
Why did you plaster over the hole I punched in the door?
This is where we used to live

Why did you keep the mousetrap?
Why did you keep the dish rack?
These things used to be mine
I guess they still are, I want them back

Broke into the old apartment
Forty-two steps from the street
Crooked landing, crooked landlord
Narrow laneway filled with crooks
This is where we used to live
Why did they pave the lawn?
Why did they change the locks?
Why did I have to break in, I only came here to talk
This is where we used to live

How is the neighbour downstairs?
How is her temper this year?
I turned up your TV and stomped on the floor just for fun
I know we don't live here anymore
We bought an old house on the Danforth
She loves me and her body keeps me warm
I'm happy there
But this is where we used to live

Broke into the old apartment
Tore the phone out of the wall
Only memories, fading memories
Blending into dull tableaux

I want them back 


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