Dave Matthews Band: Grace Is Gone Meaning

Song Released: 2002

Grace Is Gone Lyrics

Neon shines through smoky eyes tonight,
Its 2 am, Im drunk again,
Its heavy on my mind, its heavy on my mind.

I could never love again,
So much as I love you.
Where you end, where I begin,
Is like a river going through.

Take my heart,...

1. 1TOP RATED

   #1 top rated interpretation:
   anonymous

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   Nov 16th 2006 !⃝

   wowawiwo. I know for a fact that this song is for his step-father. at one of his shows he said "this song I wrote just after my step-dad died. I found it hard to squeeze stepfather into a song so.. I just did the easy thing". He meant this song to have an overtone about love, but the undertone is about the loss of his stepfather.

2. 2TOP RATED

   #2 top rated interpretation:
   anonymous

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   Sep 12th 2008 !⃝

   I 100% guarantee you it is written in memory of his step dad, who had a significant and positive influence in Dave's life. Obviously its not meant to be interpreted literally and is merely a melancholy song expressing the grief he felt at the man's passing. please refrain from ridiculing each others interpretations. What's real to one person may not be real to another. Its good to express what you think a song is about, but in doing so there is no need to belittle someone else's opinion.
3. anonymous

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   Oct 17th 2020 !⃝

   A great song has many possible interpretations. This is a great song. Before I even knew of this discussion, or the prevalence of interpretations involving death or his stepfather, I felt the impact of loss in this song. After my wife's death, I played it often. The lines, "one drink to remember, another to forget" had particular resonance for me. Though I rarely followed that literally, the conflict of memory and forgetting was something I really got. Even now, I play it and go back. You never really "get over" loss - and a pox on anyone who insists that you must.
4. anonymous

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   Oct 28th 2018 !⃝

   Grace is obviously a double entendre
5. anonymous

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   Apr 5th 2018 !⃝

   I like to think it is about U.S military who love this country so much but then realize that a lot of what they do has no grace. I am ex military and when I hear this song it make me think how after going to war I looked at this country/government differently. "when I walk away, its dead hand lay in mine"
6. anonymous

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   Jul 27th 2016 !⃝

   Obviously about his dad dying.....intermixed with grace....his wife who died.
7. countryfirefighter

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   Jul 3rd 2014 !⃝

   I feel like this is not his father or anyone family related. If you would humor me for a moment. In the song when the world ends on the album every day released the year prior to busted stuff there is a point in the song when he sings "oh graces" "oh grace". This song has very bold sexual connotations. A year later on the somewhat more tragically named album break stuff he sings about his grace being gone and drinking in my eyes this grace was a lover.
8. anonymous

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   May 9th 2014 !⃝

   This song is about the death of his step father and when he refers to his "grace" being gone, he is referring to the Grace of God. So I have read. However, songs take on their own interpretation, based on the listener. Ease up peeps.
9. anonymous

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   Dec 18th 2012 !⃝

   "You think a thing's impossible, then the sun refused to shine, I woke with you beside me, your cold hand lay in mine."
   These lyrics are clearly about a loved one dying. Dave is often vague about the specifics of who and more about conveying emotions. Art at its best.
10. anonymous

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    Nov 21st 2010 !⃝

    It is about his step-dad. I have the acoustic version where he states this. To the people who think someone dumped him...the line "your cold hand lay in mine" will refute that entirely. The person he is refering to is deceased (his step-dad).
11. anonymous

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    Aug 18th 2010 !⃝

    This song has nothing to do with his sister, and her name was Anne. It's actually about his father, but Grace is a name he used solely as a vague name for any woman. His twin daughter is now named Grace, though.
12. anonymous

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    Sep 9th 2009 !⃝

    This is about the death of his step father who happened to be "full of grace" in life.
13. Astout_fiveonetree

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    Dec 30th 2008 !⃝

    These "interpretations" are what you think they mean not the reasons he wrote them....right?
14. kaseitz24

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    Oct 11th 2008 !⃝

    This song is about his stepdad dying
    
    He says at the beginning of one live version:
    "This was just after my step dad died, so it's the kind of song that was dedicated to him sort of... but I found it hard to squeeze a step dad into a song, so I sort of did the easy thing"
15. oregoniangal

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    Jul 24th 2008 !⃝

    "Grace is gone" is about one losing their faith, strength, and spirit, not in a religious way, but in a spiritual way. someone has broken his heart. "her cold hand lay in mine"...could be interpreted as death, but more of the loss and death of a relationship. It is the hand of the one he loves who no longer loves him the way he wants her to. Her hand doesn't have the love and warmth it used to.
16. anonymous

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    Apr 27th 2008 !⃝

    This song is about his sister Anne who was murdered. Grace is referring to how he is acting or feeling, and being drunk. He wrote this she died. Dave cried during the first time he played the song.

    This interpretation has been marked as poor. view anyway
17. anonymous

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    Apr 18th 2008 !⃝

    A couple of you are right, he has said that this song is about his step-father dying, but he says he is too "pussywhipped" to write about it in that light. So he wrote about losing a girl.

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