In honour of The Tragically Hip’s latest album, We Are The Same, released April 7th, here’s a brief series that demonstrates the manner in which I expect my students to approach poetry — without any research, and without any input from those who may know Gord Downie’s purposes for each song. I will analyse and speculate on each song’s possible meanings. For me, the poetry of TTH’s music is great literature; among the best.
Track #7: The Exact Feeling
FIRST IMPRESSIONS
Title
- the ex-act feeling: My favourite theme of theirs is reflecting on songwriting, singing, and performing… I find myself looking for it in every song
Interesting Words
- “I got no more innarest”
- “The perimeter, the ceiling / Just to dribble somewhere new”
Images
- Performing — in a circus ring, as a busker, at a concert
Favourite Quote
Not the singularity
Of a thousand million dreams
Not a prosperity that means
I never have to say a thing
Possible Paraphrase
“Here comes that feeling that I always get when I’m here in front of a crowd. But, do I still want it? Yes! It’s all I’ve ever wanted. I remember when I had to try so hard to please a crowd. Now, I’m here. I’m drunk on the very idea of singing. And I want this to continue. I don’t want to go anywhere. Let’s make this tour last forever… because it feels great.”
SUMMARY
I like to hear about where The Tragically Hip gets their inspiration and perhaps I spend time looking too hard for that… Perhaps this is a stretch to suggest that the feeling they get from performing live is their motivation to write, sing, and tour?
It was interesting to hear Gord Downie speak about this song when he was interviewed on CBC’s “Q”. He spoke about singing “innarest” like Neil Young, which gets me thinking about the way artists inspire one another, and are inspired by one another, all the time.
The title of this song reflects the title of the album, I think. To have the exact feeling is to be, in some way, the same. Perhaps this speaks to their success as a band, and how part of them misses the early years of playing in small bars in smaller towns, riding the thrill of growing recognition.
I came across a connection between your “batman begins” and The Hip poetry/lyric analysis. (btw, great that you’re giving these students an introduction to The Hip!)
Metric is a multinational band with a Canadian as lead singer. I was on youtube the other day checking out Metric’s video for “Give me Sympathy”, when I noticed a related video showing behind the scenes and how they did it all in one continuous shoot.
This caused me to recall your comments about angles and director intent. It just struck me that this was perhaps an(other) example of convergence (regarding the units you cover) in popculture/real life.
Original video:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LqldwoDXHKg&feature=fvw
With behind the scenes:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jHt5caARmh0&feature=channel
Jason, thank you for this excellent comment and the YouTube links. I really enjoyed that music video and the behind the scenes clip. I will show both of those videos to my Grade 12s on Monday!