MPowered Posted August 18, 2013 Share Posted August 18, 2013 Mer Girl is the perfect album ender. I think they should've made Little Star the b-side to ROL and put Has to Be on the album as track 12. It would made more sense anyway. THANTH -> Has to Be -> Mer Girl Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
MPowered Posted August 18, 2013 Share Posted August 18, 2013 This is very similar to what I thought "Mer Girl" (as a title) always meant. At the time the album was released, she seemed obsessed with WATER as a metaphor - "Drowned World", "Swim", "Frozen" - the album imagery is seeped in water symbolism. Anyway, "Mer Girl" did seem like a nod to the mermaid, at least in context. Even if you think of the most famous mermaid story - Hans Christensen's "The Little Mermaid" - you find that a girl trades her fins for legs to be with her true love. Only in the end (at least in the book), she doesn't achieve it. I always felt like "Mer Girl" was a vignette about Madonna seeking fame to transplant the negative feelings about losing her mother, only to find that the trade didn't help. Hence, she used her freedom to keep running. She never found peace in it. If you read between the lines of Paradise you'll see that it basically talks about the same thing. It talks about how her mother's death made her so ambitious trying to become famous and successful. In the end she realizes, that this world she's living in was not the aparadise she thought it was going to be. Fame was her substitute for love. The substitute for the love of a mother she never had. And now that she's become a mother herself, she gets this love but the other way round and eventhough this gives her a little peace the death of her mother will always be there inside of her, as a memory. It'll never be forgotten, that's why she's still running away. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
ryan Posted August 18, 2013 Share Posted August 18, 2013 Has to Be should have been a hidden track. I see it as a summary of the whole album. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
rb19 Posted August 18, 2013 Share Posted August 18, 2013 If you read between the lines of Paradise you'll see that it basically talks about the same thing. It talks about how her mother's death made her so ambitious trying to become famous and successful. In the end she realizes, that this world she's living in was not the aparadise she thought it was going to be. Fame was her substitute for love. The substitute for the love of a mother she never had. And now that she's become a mother herself, she gets this love but the other way round and eventhough this gives her a little peace the death of her mother will always be there inside of her, as a memory. It'll never be forgotten, that's why she's still running away. I've always thought Paradise was about contemplating suicide and deciding that as much as she may long to be with her mother, dying wasn't the way to do it. And regarding Isaac, didn't it have a lot of names and she couldn't choose one which felt appropriate which is why we wound up with the simple if random "Isaac" Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Easy Ride Posted August 18, 2013 Share Posted August 18, 2013 'Mer Girl', an absolute masterpiece. I get goosebumps every time I listen to it. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Narendra Sen Posted August 18, 2013 Share Posted August 18, 2013 Oh was it? I know it was The Binding of Isaac. That would have been an epic song title Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Narendra Sen Posted August 18, 2013 Share Posted August 18, 2013 This is very similar to what I thought "Mer Girl" (as a title) always meant. At the time the album was released, she seemed obsessed with WATER as a metaphor - "Drowned World", "Swim", "Frozen" - the album imagery is seeped in water symbolism. Anyway, "Mer Girl" did seem like a nod to the mermaid, at least in context. Even if you think of the most famous mermaid story - Hans Christensen's "The Little Mermaid" - you find that a girl trades her fins for legs to be with her true love. Only in the end (at least in the book), she doesn't achieve it. I always felt like "Mer Girl" was a vignette about Madonna seeking fame to transplant the negative feelings about losing her mother, only to find that the trade didn't help. Hence, she used her freedom to keep running. She never found peace in it. Interesting point of view. As for the bolded part, it does seem so. Even the album artwork supports that - the limited edition of ROL was stunning and water-like and the standard cover had that blue-green-ish color. Her hair is very "messy" and all over the place, as if she were under water (imo) and I remember even the coat she wore was part of some aquatic themed line of clothes or something (don't really know the correct fashion terms, that's the best I could do). To answer the OP - although I definitely love both tracks, ROL is a perfect album as it is. I wouldn't change anything about it. Mer Girl is the perfect closer. But I'm glad Has To Be still got released in some form instead of it being just another unreleased Madonna song (like my beloved Gone Gone Gone). I hope she performs it one day Cyberraga-style. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
MPowered Posted August 18, 2013 Share Posted August 18, 2013 Has to Be would be a great as an interlude. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Guest bluejean Posted August 18, 2013 Share Posted August 18, 2013 This is very similar to what I thought "Mer Girl" (as a title) always meant. At the time the album was released, she seemed obsessed with WATER as a metaphor - "Drowned World", "Swim", "Frozen" - the album imagery is seeped in water symbolism. Anyway, "Mer Girl" did seem like a nod to the mermaid, at least in context. Even if you think of the most famous mermaid story - Hans Christensen's "The Little Mermaid" - you find that a girl trades her fins for legs to be with her true love. Only in the end (at least in the book), she doesn't achieve it. I always felt like "Mer Girl" was a vignette about Madonna seeking fame to transplant the negative feelings about losing her mother, only to find that the trade didn't help. Hence, she used her freedom to keep running. She never found peace in it. Yes! Very good points. I think when she talks about "substitute for love" she is partly referring to the love of her mother that she was missing. I've always been fascinated too by the inclusion of the "you see" from Why I Follow The Tigers. Because I love that piece. It's basically (to me) about being fearlessly an individual rather than being part of the crowd. But it's connection to Drowned World to me has always been fairly vague to me. The songwriters of that song received a songwriting credit on Drowned Worls which always seemed strange to me because apart from those 2 spoken words at the start it doesn't really take anything else from the song imo. I would love someone to ask Madonna about this one day and hear her talk about Why I Follow The Tigers and how she feels it relates to Drowned World and why that small sample was I included and why the writers received such a big credit on her own song. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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