Episode 32: You Only Hear The Music When Your Heart Begins To Break

"You only live forever in the lights you make/when we were young, we used to say/that you only hear the music when your heart begins to break/now we are the kids from yesterday."

 -My Chemical Romance, "The Kids From Yesterday"

   Above is what's probably my favorite lyric from a band I've liked for a while. It comes from their last album, Danger Days. I honestly didn't know the song for quite a while, until I heard it playing in an episode of Doom Patrol. I recognized Gerard Way's voice, Googled the words I heard, and the song quickly became one of my favorite MCR songs. The lyric expresses an idea I've wanted to write about for a while, and I've used song lyrics to structure blog episodes before, so I'm gonna do that again. The title of this blog will be the main lyric I focus on, but we'll go through every part of the whole quote I put in the beginning.

The Lights You Make

   Whether or not you believe an afterlife, what is obvious to all of us is that our time on Earth is temporary. No one lives forever, at least not in the mortal coil. When we're gone from the Earth, all that will be left of us on it is the impact we made on it, and on anyone that we leave behind. Those are the lights we make. It's a deep way of saying your legacy. 

   Even an atheist, whose thought of death is pure nothingness, wants to have at least somewhat of a legacy. If we don't make our mark on this world, what's the point of living? And I'm by no means saying we all have to be famous or cure some disease or something. Making lights can be as simple as being a good friend or relative, being kind, being an example of a good person.

When We Were Young, We Used To Say That...

   In the context of what follows this lyric, I think this part speaks to numbness that comes with age. He is saying that because he is older, he doesn't care as much about the "music" anymore. He is only upset that his heart is breaking.

You Only Hear The Music When Your Heart Begins To Break

   This part reminds me of a Jason Gray song where he sings, "the wound is where the light gets in." The idea behind both lyrics is that, in order for things to improve, they have to get worse. If you're having a rough go of things, you have to keep in mind that it's not always going to be that way. Your heart has to break for you to hear the music. 

   From a Christian standpoint, it's saying that God will guide you through your pain and heal you, but belief in God isn't a guarantee of your life being easy. Jesus told us to take up our own crosses, and that in this life we will have struggles. Faith isn't a stop-all for suffering. God never told us we won't have hard times, but He did tell us we can hear the music when our hearts begin to break.

    Now, I'm aware that My Chemical Romance is not a Christian band and their lead singer, the aforementioned Gerard Way, is not a Christian person. The lyric was not written with any kind of religious intention, but it's interesting to apply that sort of interpretation to it.

Now We Are The Kids From Yesterday

   I think he is saying that despite growing older, he is still in his past mentally. That they refuse to focus on the world changing around them, but rather just pretend like they are still kids back in the times that made them comfortable.

In Conclusion

   This blog feels somewhat lazy to me. If it comes across that way, I'm sorry. But the lyric gave a cool excuse to talk about ideas I wanted to express.

See you next week!