Swans - Helpless Child

Swans - Helpless Child
From the album Soundtracks for the Blind (Silver Disc) 1996
LYRICS

Now you be the mother,
And I'll be your fool,
I'll hide myself deep inside,
Your crimson pool.
The muddy water runs,
Beneath your folds,
You won't let me breathe,
You won't let me go.
Now you be the stranger,
And I'll be the white-skinned son,
You'll blacken my innocence,
With sugar and opium...
The children were suffocating,
Down in your damp cave,
And you were the mother,
And I was the sleeping slave.
Protect me from violence,
Hold me in your cool lips,
You drug me with kindness,
So I can pretend I exist.
Now you be the oly child,
I'll suck on your breast,
You'll feed me with gasoline,
I'll burn my name in your head.

I do not own any rights to this video, all copyrights belong to Swans.

[thunderfoot]

"You drug me with kindness, so I can pretend I exist"

[charluspupuce]

Definitely the best song in the cars 3 soundtrack

[fox]

One of the greatest songs of all time.

[KOCASH_CONTEST]

Its like a psychopathic murderer reflecting on his childhood. Dark yet beautiful.

[benjybrasington]

The last part of the song is one of the most uplifting pieces of music ever

[Korewarumine]

This song is... devastating.
The first part is very melancholic with Gira singing in a so nihilistic and somber tone, creating a extremily dark and apocalyptic atmosphere.
The second part is simply brain melting. Every type of instrument start do embrace themselves, creating an unstopable growing sonic beast that just consumes your ear more and more. It's one of the most cathartic and moving moments that I ever heard in a song.
This album is really genial and incredebly deep in it's lack of structure and coherence. There's no other record like this, with this level of majesty and identity, and probably will never exist. This album is a summation of so many expecific circunstances and variables, that end creating this monumental and masterful product. One of the most disturbing, inaccesible, but beautiful albuns to ever exist.

[joem.]

10:19 is one of my favorite moments in music.

[charmicarmicat]

The helpless child is the human race and the mother is Earth.
Mother of the World is a companion song

[CD_Rhoms]

fifteenth minutes that feels like two.... absolutely incredible

[LucasXavierReis]

The "You feed me with gasoline/I'll burn my name in your head" part relates so much to my dad alcoholism and how I love him and feel like shit he does that but also I wanna outdrink him, maybe in a desperate attempt to make him suffer the same feeling of having an alcoholic loved one. Which is shitty. We're both killing ourselves. Him being 70 and falling on concrete because of his bar visits and me because of my periods of extreme drinking and then seizures and hallucinations caused by alcohol withdrawal.

[DemonSlide]

About 4 years ago this album was all I listened to when I would go to university. I used to travel for about 2 hrs and just chill back and enjoy the music. Good times. Amazing record.

[andresdiaz]

The second part of this masterpiece cannot be described un words, is the human expression of compassion, sadness, sorrow and the blue indifference of this existence.

[dart]

this song deserves to be in the album titled: 'Soundtracks for the Blind'.

[CaioAraujoRibeiro]

Someone described this song as:

"The Sound Of A Cathedral Crumbling Into Dust With Every Microsecond Extended Unto Eternity"

I think it's fitting.

[criminI]

If quality equaled record sales, this would be a 10x platinum album

[Kosmic_fire]

I’m not a Swans superfan or anything, but this album and especially this song hits like nothing else

[bbbaul]

tbh this isn‘t even rly a song that gets me down anymore, it is just pure euphoria

[connorfruth]

1:33 always gives every single one of my bones intense chills. This is one breath-taking, emotional, spiritual behemoth of a song from one of the greatest masterpiece albums to ever exist. Swans will ALWAYS be one of the most incredible and important bands of all time.

[kuka]

fantastic song. it's getting tougher each day and i am not sure if i will survive this month. at least i'm happy i found this gem

[errrcdegames]

Listening to this while having a drag on the balcony at night stargazing