The Wreckage

Album: Harmonium (2004)
Play Video

Songfacts®:

  • This song is about a car crash. Everything's going slow. She hears the engine and sees the car coming towards her, and she's thinking of the sirens of the ambulance. >>>
    Suggestion credit:
    Michelle - Anaheim, CA

Comments: 2

  • Emmie from Devils Den, CaTo me this song, as well as many songs on Harmonium which are so brilliantly written to be both pungent and obscure, is about an artists coming of age in a town of excess and getting caught up in sex, stimulents, and song. Things in support would be her history with ballet, weight and body dysmorphias, and her own journey into celebrity at a still young and vulnerable age. This song plays toward the end of the album as she has discovered her ability to self regulate has been lost, as well as she has lost herself. Speeding in slow motion is a common description of overamping when ingesting illegal stimulants. Broken glass refers to the drug itsself while simultaneously describing the loss of control and desire to end the insanity. The empty feelings that fill her during the mundane and as the risk draqs near she contemplates entertaining it. Flying is the high and slow motion refers again to the overamping, the wrsckage whicb has become her life while she deems it undesirable still draws her in again. "Speed"ing, wreckless, imagining the crisis to come, perhaps not indulging yet, but still it stays so close in a battle with herself and her desires.
  • Maddie from New York, Ny"The Wreckage" is about a car accident and how everything slows down at that time. She wishes that someone could save her but she is "speading into the horizon".
see more comments

Editor's Picks

Metallica

MetallicaFact or Fiction

Beef with Bon Jovi? An unfortunate Spandex period? See if you can spot the true stories in this Metallica version of Fact or Fiction.

Marvin Gaye

Marvin GayeFact or Fiction

Did Marvin try out with the Detroit Lions? Did he fake crazy to get out of military service? And what about the cross-dressing?

Jason Newsted (ex-Metallica)

Jason Newsted (ex-Metallica)Songwriter Interviews

The former Metallica bassist talks about his first time writing a song with James Hetfield, and how a hand-me-down iPad has changed his songwriting.

Dan Reed

Dan ReedSongwriter Interviews

Dan cracked the Top 40 with "Ritual," then went to India and spent 2 hours with the Dalai Lama.

Little Big Town

Little Big TownSongwriter Interviews

"When seeds that you sow grow by the wicked moon/Be sure your sins will find you out/Your past will hunt you down and turn to tell on you."

Brandi Carlile

Brandi CarlileSongwriter Interviews

As a 5-year-old, Brandi was writing lyrics to instrumental versions lullabies. She still puts her heart into her songs, including the one Elton John sings on.