#if anybody else wants any analysis erm. ask me and i'll probably do it x

[thekidsarentalright]

hiii atlas! as u know i am a wams girlie before i am anything else sooo if u want (ONLY if u want) could u do an analysis of wams? i’d love to look into ur mind for this song :3

also ily mwah mwah <333

hiiiiiii spi!!! i am so glad u asked me to do this because god i missed analyzing stuff and this one was VERY fun and interesting to do. so, without further adieu, under the cut is my analysis of wams!!!

as i tend to like to do w my analysis’ (analyses? whatever fksjdhf), we’re gonna start off with looking at the first verse and breaking it down as it needs to be from there, with wams starting off with: “I'm a young one stuck in the thoughts / Of an old one's head / When all the others were just stirrin' awake / I'm tryna trick myself to fall asleep again”

This entire first verse is very cohesive so is best to be analyzed together. to me, this is very much a commentary on the narrator’s loss of innocence, and this continued theme in the song of juxtaposition (here being the juxtaposition of young and old, others and myself), and loneliness too. essentially what i believe this first verse is trying to say is that our narrator is young, they know they’re still young, but they’ve been so weathered by the world, by their life experiences, that they feel their thoughts, their mind, is older than their body. not necessarily that they have an old soul at all, but more that they’ve just experienced and gone through so much that it’s altered their thoughts, maybe their view of the world, even. the second two lyrics continue to describe this, with the narrator saying that all other people are just beginning their lives and experiencing things, maybe just beginning true aging that can alter a person’s views and perceptions, while they’re trying to ‘fall asleep’, to shut his mind off, to quiet those thoughts and maybe even try to go back to where all the others just woke up from- a place of innocence and lack of world-view altering experience. 

“My head’s in Heaven, my soles are in Hell / Let’s meet in the purgatory of my hips and get well” is the pre-chorus that continues to solidify the juxtapositions seen throughout this song- with the obvious one here being Heaven and Hell. These lyrics are also continuing a commentary on the state of our narrator and their perception of the world and themself, with this essentially saying- their head, their thoughts (once again referencing their thoughts that have been altered and changed from innocent to not!) are only well intentioned, they wants to do his best and do good, their intentions/wants/hopes/dreams are in alignment with being Heavenly, approved by God. But one could interpret their soles being in Hell perhaps meaning their actions do not necessarily align with this, their Thoughts are good but what they Act Out is not as well intentioned or meaning. meanwhile, because their head is in heaven and feet are in hell, their hips are in purgatory- a neutral ground of sorts, where people go immediately after death to be purified before going to heaven. however, the narrator is dirtying the idea of purgatory by alluidng to sex with meeting in the purgatory of their hips to ‘get well’. with this, i think the narrator is absolutely trying to say that, to cope with their struggles, with the fact they want to act in one way but actually act in another, that they’re so young but feel so weathered by the world, they use sex. it’s a relatively common theme in fob songs, XO being a major example of using things like one night stands and sex to cope with heavy emotions and struggles, and i don’t think this lyric is at all immune from that theme. 

the chorus is rather interesting to me, with it reading, “Hurry, hurry / You put my head in such a flurry, flurry / Oh freckle, freckle, what makes you so special? / Oh, what makes you so special? / I'm gonna leave you / Oh, I'm gonna teach you / How we're all alone / How we're all alone”, and here i think the narrator, after spending the song before this detailing how damaged and weathered by the world, how they have sex just to escape their heavy feelings, is commenting on a person who perhaps, for once, actually helps ease the pain. that’s much more conjecture than actual hard analysis, but the lyrics clearly do lead me to believe that! with how they say this person, this muse, puts their head in a flurry and is almost accusatorily questioning what makes them so special. what makes them help our narrator feel Different than other people have made them feel. it’s something unfamiliar and uncomfortable to our narrator, and they respond much like an untrustworthy wild animal would towards kindness- lashing out. they’re gonna leave this person, they’re gonna teach them how we’re all alone. not only is the narrator leaving this person alone, but they’re forcing more loneliness upon themself because it’s what they’re used to. it’s comfortable to be lonely. plus, if they view everybody as alone, then they won’t be so othered from everyone else.

however, after our narrator pushes this person away, the next verse juxtaposes that with saying, “Guild me, build me, it's your club, so / Let me in (let me in) / Knowing how heartwarming it is inside / Your skin”. though this could be seen to be about a person, perhaps even the same person they were just talking about, i want to propose that the muse is shifted here. this song, to me, is really just account the narrators struggles and vices in life, and isn’t specifically about one muse or person at all. i feel, now, the narrator is discussing fame, or even more broadly just a desire for attention from anyone, not a specific person. even after forcing loneliness on themself, they don’t want to be alone. “Guild me, build me, it’s your club, so / Let me in” is showing the narrator’s desire to be included in something, to be built up by other people (turning themself into whatever others need them to be, even?), to get more attention and love that they desperately desire. they want this so bad that they want to be under their skin, which is commonly also a phrase used to describe when someone is annoyed/annoying someone, which Also says to me that they’re SO desperate for this love and attention that they’ll even go to lengths such as being irritating just to get it. 

until the outro, the rest of the song just repeats what we’ve already gone over with the pre-chorus and chorus, with the next new lyrics being the outro which says, “Mama, if we don't take the medication / We won't sleep for days, we won't sleep for days / And Mama, if we pray to the lord, oh / Does he sing on a stage? Does he sing on a stage? / We waste it all in the back of a long dark car / And I'm a sunshine machine / Uh, I want to get stuck, I want to get stuck / And be golden in your memory”, which is a lot so we’re gonna go break it down a bit more!

“Mama, if we don’t take the medication / We won’t sleep for days, we won’t sleep for days” is how the outro starts, with this making me think it could mean two things: to take it literally, they are just factually stating that if medication is not taken, sleep will not happen. this is just continuing to detail what the narrator has been the entire song, their problems and struggles with themself and the world. they struggle and suffer so much they need medication, whether this medication is literal as already discussed or more metaphorical/symbolic. what i mean by that is, maybe they don’t mean literal sleeping meds but instead mean they need what they use to cope- like sex, as was referenced earlier. or just the general things they do to get that surface-level love and attention they crave. i believe this also is such a heavy callback to the very beginning of the song, “When all the others were just stirrin' awake / I'm tryna trick myself to fall asleep again”, where the narrator is Now showing what they do to try and trick themself to fall asleep again.

“and Mama, if we pray to the lord, oh / Does he sing on a stage? Does he sing on a stage?” is probably the hardest to analyze lyric in this whole song, as i can’t say specifically what pete meant by this when he wrote it as it’s a sort of vague reference, very open to interpretation, i suppose. for my purposes, i feel as though this is the narrator wondering if they pray, maybe for a better life or less suffering or what have you, will god respond? will god respond in a grandiose way, singing on a stage, to me, representing god responding in a way that is clear and obvious (and helpful). i also feel this could be the narrator referencing finding solace and hope and help in music, asking if they pray to God, does God respond through things people use to cope, like with music. though i think this is meant to be interpreted less religiously than that sounds, with me more meaning if they pray, will they find hope in the things they use to cope and love, like in music. “We waste it all in the back of a long dark car / And I'm a sunshine machine”, is once again a lyric that i’m going to offer two interpretations for, both detailing the coping mechanisms the narrator has been referencing in this outro before now: sex and drugs. with sex, the narrator is saying they waste “it all�� (themselves, their worth, their life) in the back of a limo (also a reference to fame!), with the sunshine machine part being more sarcastic with this interpretation, as clearly doing these depraved things to cope with life are not actually making them happy or sunshiney. with drugs, LSD used to be incredibly commonly called ‘sunshine’ (i also feel the need to mention that ‘sunshine’ is used to refer to drugs in 27 as well, which supports this being the ‘right’ interpretation) meaning the narrator could be saying they’re literally wasted in the back of a limo, while wasting themself and their life away, doing sunshine to make themself feel good in this depraved, conflicting, harrowing life they’re leading. the song ends with these lyrics, “I want to get stuck, I want to get stuck / And be golden in your memory”, a simple way to end such a complex and desperately sad song. the narrator, here, is essentially saying that they want to get stuck in your head, whether this be a literal fourth wall break to be saying they wanna get stuck in our, the fans, heads, or the former muse spoken about in this song, or just people’s head’s, broadly and unspecific. believe what you want, i can’t decide which fits best for you! and regardless, they want to get stuck in your head and become golden in your memory- golden, commonly meaning expensive and perfect, something to be sought after and revered. this absolutely fits with what we’ve heard from the narrator of the song so far- they just want to be loved and to have attention, they’re so horribly lonely and force themself to be lonely because it’s all they know. they’ve gone through so much, they’re so beaten and battered, they just want to be golden to somebody. they just want to be special to somebody, even if they'll end up pushing that person away. because as much as they want that, we're all alone, and that's all they think we'll ever be.