Black Crowes: She Talks To Angels Meaning
Song Released: 1991
She Talks To Angels Lyrics
In certain company
Yes, she’ll tell you she’s an orphan
After you meet her family
She paints her eyes as black as night, now
She pulls those shades down tight
Yeah, she gives a smile when the pain...
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1TOP RATED
#1 top rated interpretation:If you've ever been unfortunate enough to find yourself on this hellbound train, you know full well that this song is about addiction. The word is not mentioned "in certain company" because evryone is in denial. "She'll tell you she's an orphan, after you've met hr family" signifies the life of lies and deceit she must live in order to support her habit and/or justify her behavior. The lines about painting her eyes as dark as night and pulling the shades down tight describe the private world she creates for herself when she's using. She can be anyone she wants to be, and she wants no interruptions during this very private time. I see the lock of hair as someone that, at one time, meant everything to her but is no longer a part of her life. It represents the excruciating pain that brought her here, as well as the guilt and shame that keep her here. The cross is spirituality. It's the only thing she has left to provide a glimmer of hope in a lifestyle that is hopeless by definition. "She gives a smile when the pain comes. The pain's gonna make everything alright." The pain associated with IV drug use is nothing compared to the effects of the drug, which will, if only for a short while, allow her to forget the traumatic events that have changed her life forever. This is a very important song to me. I lived that life for a long time and somehow survived. Oh, and by the way . . . The title, "She Talks To Angels"? Trust me, my friends, she talks to them. And they do call her out by her name. Been there, Done that.
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2TOP RATED
#2 top rated interpretation:I agree with all of you almost. The only thing that you are missing is after he says"to her it don't mean nothin'"(witch by the way is terrible grammar,but hey, this is music), he says" But to me it means everything" This obviously signals that he cares for her! Maybe he knows her from before the addiction and still isnpassionate for her. Hey, love is crazy.
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3TOP RATED
#3 top rated interpretation:It is definitely about self harm addiction. I know I started at12 or earlier. I'm now 52. For the last three years I have not cut or burned myself. But it's been a struggle. Some days easyer than others
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Always reminds me of my beautiful and crazy cousin Cindy Lazarin. She eventually lost her long life battle with heroin. Leaving behind to beautiful boys. I see myself in her.i understand. I will forever love her and miss her.❤️
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For me this song resonates on both sides of addiction, a woman with her own and perhaps watching now the addiction of her child. Addiction comes in many forms, not just drugs and they all can remove people from each other. There are many ways to lose someone, she may have lost him through actions of her own or actions of the boy. That perspective would be from a woman not young, but very seasoned in life from the bad hands she’s been dealt. Addiction isn’t mentioned around certain people because it is the elephant in the room, maybe hers or the boy now grown. She pulls her shades down tight because she is always watching but doesn’t want that observed by others. The lock of hair she carries is from a time when there was promise that the boy would break the cycle, she doesn’t want you to know her family because it is so fractured that she feels better off alone. She wears the cross around her neck, it could represent Jesus or it could have belonged to someone before her that she missed meeting and having in her own life. She talks to Angels definitely as she seeks solace and when she is st her lowest they call out to her to bring her from the brink. The pain, well it is welcome at times as it causes her to know she still feels. Pain often comes at the end of things, either for better or worse, the end can bring relief.
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About a woman who lost a son I know because I did lose a son reminds me of the isolation you feel nobody understands the pain or the fact that it has changed you forever just my thoughts ❤️
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If you don't understand the song you haven't lived by "it" i mean the throes of addiction.
It's not something you can explain, the pain makes it alright because then it's the drugs taking the pain away so therefore it's justified.
Until you walk a mile... -
She talks to angels. Says they all know her name. The angels in the lyrics could actually be fallen angels that the Bible refers to. In other words, the angels/demons continually call her name & persuade her to use the drug. The cross is someone she has not met, NOT YET. I believe it's a reference to Jesus meaning she'll either meet Him & find freedom from the addiction that's killing her or she'll lose her life to the addiction & go to live with, (meet) Jesus.The hair is for a little boy is referring to her son that she likely lost due to her addiction. She'll tell you she's an orphan, after you meet her family is a reference to the tendency for lying that addicts possess.It could also mean that her family abandoned her because of her addiction. She pulls her shades down tight because she feels shame for what she's doing & wants to keep those moments of being high private. I can imagine the reasoning behind each lyric in the song. I can also relate personally & I know several others that 'get it' too. God bless her, that little boy, her family, & the man that possibly loves this lost & addicted woman.
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The pain is the Heroin. It's has caused all her pain but also makes her feel all right.
Paints her eyes as black as night, pulls those shade down tight. She closes up in her own world after the pain makes her feel alright.
She tells you she's an orphan after you meet her family. Because she is. They have disowned her.
The locket is her little boy. This could be the cause her drug problem or the result of it. The cross is her saviour who she hasn't met yet. -
This is such a painful song. I see how addicts are often orphaned by their families who are tired of the lies, hurt and deception. Sometimes an addicts family pushes the addict out to hit “rock bottom” or attempts to use hard love on them magnifying the conception of being an orphan. These actions also push the addict into a deeper darkness requiring more self medication. I believe the hair is from her child’s head who is not alive perhaps because her addiction. The cross represents the hope she has that she can be healed but she is not at that point yet. She speaks to angels, her child,and people she has loved and lost in life and they could call her name. Mama, and those who encouraged her to beat this, mama, I love you, encouraging words from people that have tried to help her deal with her pains of addiction, depression, lack of self worth and called her name with encouragement. These folks may not be literally angels but, they were good but are gone now. Her eyes are dark, shades tight to block out the circle of pain, hurt, and disappointment she feels. However, when the pain of these hopeless memories, disappointments and entrapment she feels arise she smiles because she has a fix… a temporary relief from the demons she carries. This song breaks my heart and exemplifies the brokenness, depression, and trap an addict finds themself in.
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A man remembering his one real relationship with someone as broken as him self
Who he will never forget in his whole lifetime
And she remembers him too
Untill the end of time -
The song that captures addiction better than any other, from the lyrics to the angst of Chris’s voice.
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As far as I'm concerned, the "meaning" of the song means NOTHING; the real meaning comes in what it means to the people who are/were living their version of this truth. Some people believe the pain is figurative, some believe it's cutting and some believe it's the needle (heroin). Some believe the little boy dies, some believe that he's taken away. None of that really matters...I know that a lot of people tell their own story through this song.
Thankfully, I've never had to deal with any of the possible theoretical meanings but here's my guess: I see a woman, late 20's/early 30's, she got knocked up young and kicked out of her house by her bible-thumper parents. I prefer to believe that her little boy was taken away by her parents after they proved her unfit but I think it's more likely that he passed away as a toddler by a foolish accident of hers. As far as I'm concerned, the pain that makes everything alright is the prick of the needle as she shoots heroin to forget that she's lost everything that's ever mattered to her. -
This song could be about a woman with mental illness. Many of the mentally ill also have addictions. As a person with schizophrenia I have spoken with angels who are voices in my head on many occasions. Also spiritual beliefs come to the forefront for many with what I have. When I am ill I become very spiritual, whereas when I'm okay I become an agnostic, someone to whom the colours of life dull out. The pain comes when one is deep into an episode, but if one is capable, one can keep quiet and still smile...
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Addiction is something people don't necessarily want to discuss openly nor do alot of people want to hear about. But i think this song is really about heroin and the hurt it has caused and walls we build to protect ourselves. Whether one (we) realizes it or not. Think it's about Estrangement - lost, and a struggle with spiritual faith and building trust. overall sad but it touches me.
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After reading Chris Robinson's meaning to the song and reading everyone else's interpretation i could relate on how the words just came to Chris in his speculation of the girl in the club. I wrote a song called Dear Daddy about a girl writing for her daddy to save her and take her home to him and her mom. At the time, i did not use hard drugs and booze like in my song(was not about me though)..so it was a feeling that was destined to be shared somehow. I feel Chris drew on an intrepretation of young people through looking at the girl and incorporated it into the lyrics like me as a cry for help for young people going down as he witnessed in the crowd. Many of whom probably wore crosses and some who carried other sentimental items of loved ones. The girl in my song was called dusty blue who pleaded for her parents to not ignore her but save her from herself. Ironically after writing this,I got into a car accident with my friends and near to death called out the first name "daddy". So his words just came to him from imagination and witnessing drug use and what was becoming an epidemic at that time with cutting on the horizon. And Every mother back in the day used to keep a lock of baby hair from first born son. My version is that the son had died later on in life. She now old lady in home where her family leaves her referring to herself as an orphan. She wears a cross because of her strong faith she holds onto and being so wronged by family and others for protection..she talks to her angel son and the other angels who died like him for advice as she suffers from abuse by the people looking after her so she doesnt feel alone. I get this because near the end of the song she dies..yes, the singer agrees she talks to angels. She not hurting no more.
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She is a lost soul who seeks redemption.will she find it?that I don't know .i hope so.then maybe I will be alright....
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My first said this song reminded him of me. He either didn't grasp the real meaning behind this song. There were certain parts that were me but he didn't realize at that time how he was foreshadowing my furture. I didn't grasp it all until much later in life when it came on the radio and I could relate to it in it's true form. I was never a heroin addict but suffered with other addictions. In fact, I've never touched heroin or an opiate because my mom was a heroin addict. It only took 35 years to understand the lyrics because until you've been there, you couldn't.
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