Biography on Richard Ashcroft & ExplicationInterpretation of song - Essay Example

I'm quite a shy, introverted person and I could easily melt away into the background. But I am driven to write tunes. Creativity for me is almost like therapy, my songs take you into the underbelly of my mind and there's some dark stuff in there. If I lived in LA, I'd be seeing someone three times a day, every day. But I'm a northern Englishman dealing with his shit in his own way." (Ashcroft, 2006). . This song is one of great poetry, and is by the same account, accurately titled 'Sonnet'. This song is a 14 line poem with an octave rhyming of abbaabba.

It is almost a country-tinged gentle pop song "that floats in an extraordinary amount of space through which what sounds like echo effects of ping and wobble, but it's heart is the strummed acoustic that opens the song and carries its theme." (The Zine, n.d.). There is a certain subtlety and craft in this song; of which is considered to be one of the band's most respected and poetic songs of all. Sonnet is a yearning mid-tempo love song; a lovely, surprisingly understated ballad. The innate beauty of this song is truly everlasting.

When Ashcroft sings in Sonnet, "Like a cat in the bag / waiting to drown / this time I'm coming down," it doesn't take a psychoanalyst to understand what the man is feeling. It was this song, along the Bittersweet Symphony which was considered to make the album worthwhile enough, even without the entire rest of the album included. Bittersweet SymphonyEasily one of the Verve's most infamous songs, Bittersweet Symphony is in fact considered to be one of the greatest rock and roll songs of all time.

The lyrics are a somber look at the ennui of everyday life: "You're a slave to money, then you die." The lyrics and meanings of these lyrics are obvious and overt in this song; the undying honestly and heartfeltness in this song is made openly clear:"Well I never prayBut tonight I'm on my knees, yeahI need to hear some soundsThat recognize the pain in me, nowI let the melody shine,Let it cleanse my mind, I feel free nowBut the airways are clean and there's nobody singing to me now"The song expresses much emotion, basically describing someone who feels conformed by society, and who wants to change themselves.

The song is incredibly liberating, with an easy sensibility about the person's emotion, excitement, and willingness to changenot for someone else, but rather for himself, "It's a bittersweet symphony, this life," meaning that there is both good and bad in this world, and that, "depending on how you choose to live your life, you may experience its bitterness, sweetness, or both." (Thedaythemusicdied, 2006). From this review, we can see that the band the Verve is an emotional, incredibly talented, and linguistically brilliant group, whose somewhat short period of infamousness will surely never be forgotten.

At the height of their fame in 1997, they were easily considered as one of the finest bands from the UK and were one of the most popular groups worldwide before they abruptly called it quits. Despite whatever turmoil the band may have