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When you fall in love, you pick up details of the person that others might overlook. Because when you’re in love, your attention is drawn to other person and you see perfection regardless of any said flaws. What this lyrics translates to is: “If someone believed me…” – meaning if someone believed me when I tell them about you and how perfect you are, or if someone other than me took the time to get to know you like I do, then they too would also be “as in love with you as I am.”

Madley Croft says that the song, “is about actually being in love; very positive lyrically. The album goes through a few different stages, and this would be the lightest.”

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“Hungry Like the Wolf” was the second single from Rio. Lyrically, it was inspired by the fairy tale, Little Red Riding Hood, while sonically, fiddling around with burgeoning technologies such as Roland’s 808 and Jupiter 8 keyboard produced the distinctive groove, according to a 2003 interview with the band for Blender Magazine.

The song was the group’s breakout hit in the US and Canada. In early 1983, it topped the chart in Canada and became their first of nine top 5 hits in the States, peaking at #3. They’d already been in the top 40 four times in their homeland the UK, where this one reached #5.

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The “morons” described will be as dangerous as a hydrogen bomb, due to their ignorance and rash decisions

This could also mean that the long-scale, lowkey conditioning the aristocracy has instilled in the lower classes could backfire on them, or that it could eventually result in the destruction or full subjugation of everyone but them. It could alternately mean that the conscious or unconscious resentment of the less privileged could result in Armageddon, with too many people lashing out at the world.

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Unlike the hectic life of the mid-‘90s, the narrator may perceive that the '60s were a time for peace & love. However, the line may actually be sarcastic, as the 1960s were also a decade of race riots, assassinations, and war. Thom Yorke once stated:

No, I don’t wish it was the fucking sixties – Levis jeans wish it was the sixties – I certainly fucking don’t.

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The very lows of what it’s like to be romantically involved with someone suffering from mental illness – the one most sane is likely to use scapegoats and half-measures in whatever tension arises to make it another day without any extreme and violent conflict.

Eventually, the protagonist separates from the love interest only to find themselves succumbing to emotional breakdowns their mentally afflicted lover was prone to.

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This part of the song is not about Jeremy Wade Delle, but about a student that Eddie Vedder went to school with in San Diego, CA named Brian. Brian didn’t kill himself, but brought a gun to school and shot up an oceanography room. Similar to Jeremy, Brian was bullied as well.

Vedder explains he remembers bullying Brian, however he [Brian] “seemed” to be “harmless” at the time from what Vedder can recall. The use of “little fuck” to mention Brian may also be used by Vedder to effectively express his emotional anger regarding the tragic shooting.

Both Jeremy and Brian were probably passive victims of bullying:

Most children in this category are not aggressive or teasing in their manner and usually do not actively provoke others in their surroundings. However, passive victims of bullying generally signal, through their behavior and attitudes, that they are a bit anxious and unsure of themselves.

Detailed interviews with parents of bullied boys predominantly of the passive/submissive type indicate that these boys were characteristically rather careful and sensitive from an early age. Having this kind of personality (possibly in addition to physical weakness) may have made it difficult for them to assert themselves in their group of playmates, which may have contributed to these boys becoming victims of bullying. At the same time, it is obvious that long-term bullying probably increased their anxiety, insecurity, and negative self-image

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Jeremy Delle was described by schoolmates as “real quiet” and known for “acting sad”. After coming in to class late that morning, Delle was told to get an admittance slip from the school office. He left the classroom, and returned with a .357 Magnum revolver. Delle walked to the front of the classroom, announced “Miss, I got what I really went for”, put the barrel of the firearm in his mouth, and pulled the trigger before his teacher or classmates could react.

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“Jeremy” is based on two different true stories. The song takes its main inspiration from a newspaper article about a 16-year-old boy named Jeremy Wade Delle from Richardson, Texas who killed himself in front of his English classmates at Richardson High School on Tuesday morning of January 8, 1991, at about 9:45 am.

In a 2009 interview, Vedder said that he felt “the need to take that small article and make something of it—to give that action, to give it reaction, to give it more importance.” When asked about the song, Vedder explained:

It came from a small paragraph in a paper which means you kill yourself and you make a big old sacrifice and try to get your revenge. That all you’re gonna end up with is a paragraph in a newspaper. Sixty-three degrees and cloudy in a suburban neighborhood. That’s the beginning of the video and that’s the same thing is that in the end, it does nothing… nothing changes. The world goes on and you’re gone. The best revenge is to live on and prove yourself. Be stronger than those people. And then you can come back.

The other story that the song is based on involved a student that Vedder knew from his junior high school in San Diego, California. He elaborated further in a 1991 interview:

I actually knew somebody in junior high school, in San Diego, California, that did the same thing, just about, didn’t take his life but ended up shooting up an oceanography room. I remember being in the halls and hearing it and I had actually had altercations with this kid in the past. I was kind of a rebellious fifth-grader and I think we got in fights and stuff. So it’s a bit about this kid named Jeremy and it’s also a bit about a kid named Brian that I knew and I don’t know… the song, I think it says a lot. I think it goes somewhere…and a lot of people interpret it different ways and it’s just been recently that I’ve been talking about the true meaning behind it and I hope no one’s offended and believe me, I think of Jeremy when I sing it.

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Radiohead solemnly describing a desire to be stronger emotionally.

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The light has gone out for the narrator, meaning he is completely disillusioned with life and has no hope of understanding it.

A light gone out suggests that there has been a time the light has been on. The narrator has trusted in their inner compass for a long time.

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