Tool: AEnima Meaning
Song Released: 1997
AEnima Lyrics
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1TOP RATED
#1 top rated interpretation:Bravo. I think many of you are right on, but here is my humble opinion...
Maynard (I think) is saying that we need to find ourselves. You need to figure out who you are, don't follow and don't lead. Be your-Goddamn-self!
Fuck L Ron Hubbard and fuck all his clones because he is trying to lead, and they are following.(Fuck Sheep should be in there somewhere...)He's full of "Silly Shit, Stupid Shit..."
Fuck all you gun-toting hip gangster wannabes because you aren't who you pretend to be. You have emotions just like the rest of us. You, too, are human, even if you were shot 9 times and you survived...
Fuck retro anything because if you are trying to be something or someone from the past, you are not being yourself.
Fuck tattoos because the best thing they can do is show others who you are(or who you want people to think you are), and they don't need to know. Chances are, you don't even know.
Fuck all you junkies and fuck your short memory because you are not being yourselves, the drug is controlling you, changing you. It is taking away from you, and you need to be all that you can be, as complete as you can be.
Fuck smiley glad-hands with hidden agendas because they are fake and they want to take away from you. Because they don't deserve your trust, they will take advantage of you and rape you if given the slightest chance in Hell.
Fuck these dysfunctional insecure actresses because they are fucked-up, lying, anorexic bitches who don't think they are good enough the way they are. They lie and binge and purge because they are insecure, but if they could only stop and think, they would realize that we are all imperfect, and that is the only perfect part about us. We are perfectly fallible.
He's praying for rain, tidal waves, and comets so that you will all have to learn to swim, to LEARN WHO YOU ARE, to BE YOURSELVES.
Flush away all the bullshit and what would you have in L.A., and the world over? A bunch of happy individuals who don't care what others have, because they are personally fulfilled. They may not have forty-six & 2 billion dollars, but they can swim without it, they can survive and be themselves and be... okay.
Time to bring it down again.
Don't just call me pessimist.
Try and read between the lines.
I can't imagine why you wouldn't
Welcome any change, my friend.
I, TOO, AM PRAYING FOR RAIN, TIDAL WAVES, AND COMETS.
WELCOME THE CHANGE, MY FRIENDS. -
2TOP RATED
#2 top rated interpretation:This song is about the cleansing of the inner-self of the superficial. Basically, Maynard is saying that everyone needs to stop being fake and start being themselves. An enima, of course, is cleansing of the anus and in Jungian psychology "anima" means the inner-self. If you put these together you have Ænima, or cleansing of the inner self or inner conscience.
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3TOP RATED
#3 top rated interpretation:This is based on a comedy routine by Bill Hicks, who hated the city of Los Angeles. He thought the people were very superficial and represented America at its worst. In his routine, which is sampled in the song, Hicks talks about California falling into the ocean and creating Arizona Bay. Hicks died of cancer in 1994. The album artwork contains a painting of Hicks dressed like a doctor with the caption, "Another Dead Hero."
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As interesting as it is, Zag's interpretation, is mildyly flawed. "Anima" has nothing to do water or washing except as a pun. The root of the word is from a Proto-Indo-European stem "ane" which means "to breathe". "Aenima" is another form of "Aenimus", and both words relate strongly to the conception of spirits. Animisim -that everything has a spirit- comes from the same stem. Aenima came into widespread use in the mid 1800's (1860 or so if I recall correctly) because of Jung's groundbreaking theories of consciousness which proposed that we all have a shadow-self which he called the AEnima.
That Zag can pull those meanings from the song is interesting and demonstrates the power of art: we will each take something different, and there is little to argue with. My take o0n the song is that it is literal. The ST. Andreas fault runs through LA., and we have been warned that there is a probability of coastal California experiencing an apocalyptic disaster after an extremely powerful event, and that much of lower California will fall into the sea. The "Arizona Bay" reference is to the many who joke about buying potentially beachfront property in Arizona.
Maynard's hatred for LA is emphasized by the list of "fuck your . . . [this]". It's a long list of what he hates about the city. What he is asking for is an event of biblical proportions, something close to the event involving Noah. The title is a pun based on the similarity of "aenima" and "enema", and that's where the idea of a cleansing wash comes from.
I'm a big fan of Tool, and this is one of my favorite recordings. -
This interpretation has been marked as poor. view anyway
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This interpretation has been marked as poor. view anyway
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Mother is Mother Nature. He wants California swept into the sea. All the fake actresses and retro bs. The corruption, the waste of space. California has fault lines, he wants the state I the water. Arizona would then become a bay off of the Pacific Ocean.
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This interpretation has been marked as poor. view anyway
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This is simply about how many famous idols are basically criminals in the band's eyes, and how the narrator wants to "suck it down, flush it down."
Why would I think this?
How would you explain "Here in this hopeless fucking hole we call L.A." or "Fuck these dysfunctional
Insecure actresses"?
You don't agree? Fine. I'll do this step-by-step.
Some say the end is near
Some say we'll see Armageddon soon
I certainly hope we will
I sure could use a vacation from this
People have predictions of the end of the world, and he hopes that they're right, he wants a vacation from..."this." What is..this? I'll explain later, or you'll figure it out.
Bullshit three ring circus sideshow of
Freaks
It's representing a terrible circus show or whatever. A circus where the clowns drop the bowling pins while juggling and the tightrope walkers fall off the tightropes. Not literally, this is completely metaphorical. It really means where celebrities aren't doing their job as well as they could, people are just hiring random, talentless people who can't do their job as well as others.
Here in this hopeless fucking hole we call L.A.
L.A., Los Angeles..what could be wrong with such a famous city? Perhaps the reasons it's famous. It's famous for being the 2nd largest city in the world. The tourist attractions. The population. But in a small country town, there could be so many things to do, so many unique parades that nowhere else celebrates. In other words, they're both equal. Sure, you might like one better than the other. That doesn't change the fact that they're equal. Same with people. We treat celebrities with more respect than hobos because, well, they're famous. This could also mean that a bunch of celebrities and whatnot perform there because it's filled with stages or whatever.
The only way to fix it is to flush it all away
The only way to get rid of these useless people and places in the world is to get rid of them, take them out of the world.
Any fucking time, any fucking day
Honestly, I find this line tricky. It's not a big dent in the whole song. It doesn't confirm the whole meaning..so..I'm just going to leave it alone. Sorry.
Learn to swim, I'll see you down in Arizona Bay
Learn to swim, learn to be on your own and stop depending on so much. Arizona Bay? I'm just going to guess that it's the same thing with the L.A. bit.
Fret for your figure and
Fret for your latte and
Fret for your hairpiece and
Fret for your lawsuit and
Fret for your Prozac and
Fret for your pilot and
Fret for your contract and
Fret for your car
You should be afraid for everything that's important to you, even though some of it is really stupid to be important and diminutive, like your latte or hairpiece. It will be taken away or you'll have to give it up because there will be bigger priorities for you later on.
Some say a comet will fall from the sky
Followed by meteor showers and tidal waves
Listing theories of how the world will end...
Followed by fault lines that cannot sit still
I'm not sure what fault lines could be, I'm not the sharpest tool in the barn. OH. SEE WHAT I DID THERE. Other than the stupid jokes, it means that everything is always changing.
Followed by millions of dumbfounded dip-shits
Dumbfounded dip-shits, stupid fans idiotic enough to go with whatever is mainstream.
And then always-changing
Trends; always changing.
Change is non-stop. Trends are always changing.
One great big festering neon distraction
I've a suggestion to keep you all occupied
Learn to swim
The big festering neon distraction is resembling the average popular teen idol. And...learn to swim. Learn to swim. Learn to choose on your own. Don't let society's trends pick what you like.
Mom's going to fix it all soon
Mom's coming around to put it back the way it ought to be
Mom = mother nature. Nature will eventually put all of these stupid idols back in their place, which is out of the scene.
Fuck L. Ron Hubbard and
Fuck all his clones
Every scientist is trying to discover something big, when they should just stop. Well, everyone is trying to beat the other, trying to be the same as the other.
Fuck all those gun-toting
Hip gangster wannabes
The simple gangster/thug wannabe R-tard. Just trying to fit in, wear the rapper-clone clothes (baggy pants, rolled up T-shirts, golden chains, etc.).
Fuck retro anything
Fuck your tattoos
Fuck all you junkies and
Fuck your short memory
All of these things are considered "cool" nowadays..so, what he's saying is that anything that's cool really isn't.
Fuck smiley glad-hands
With hidden agendas
Celebrities and people hide their true feelings with happiness on stage, so they seem like a good example. But really, hiding emotions really isn't a good example.
Fuck these dysfunctional
Insecure actresses
Almost everyone goes through that I'm-fat-and-everyone's-skinnier-than-me phase. So do actresses, they're just showing a bad example for all of the girls with self-esteem issues out there.
Because I'm praying for rain
And I'm praying for tidal waves
I want to see the ground give way
I want to watch it all go down
Mom, please flush it all away
I want to see it go right in and down
I want to watch it go right in
Watch you flush it all away
He hopes for rain, or destruction among all he despises mentioned in this song.
Time to bring it down again
Don't just call me pessimist
Try and read between the lines
I can't imagine why you wouldn't
Welcome any change, my friend
Now, he's trying to persuade others to see his point of view.
I want to see it all come down
Suck it down
Flush it down
And in the end, he wants to bring everything he despises listed in this song to an end.
I also heard somewhere than an "aenima" or an "aenema" is like..an anal cleansing, which I'm not really sure of. So, he's referring to all of those dumb celebrities who do nothing but apply makeup and act all friendly for whoever and singers who sound like a teenager going through puberty on auto-tune the turds in the cracks.
This is just my personal beliefs in interpretations. If you don't want to go with it, then don't. Alright. Thanks for reading! -
The problem with wishing away this reality gets you nowhere, in effect hoping that "mom will flush it away" maybe no different than being as weak and helpless as those one wishes to flush out of the anus of America. The only way to get it done maybe to make a place or any place irrelevant and unnecessary, the only way that can happen maybe if people live their own lives, not hope Maynard and his Mom can wash it away, but you just ignore it, stop buying music or movies or following other peoples lead, exactly what would end Maynard's career as a musician, he sounds helpless and self-destructive in this song, in a sense LA represents his own sense of self, he's just projecting it upon everyone else, maybe he appears as fake as anyone else, it makes it kind of hard to take this or anything else seriously, he just seems to latch onto this notion of "think for yourself, I command you" of a guru or some cult leader, why not run off to Jonestown, nope cause he's one of these fakes and he knows it, but he's not crazy as a Jim Jones to actually try to leave, cause he knows human nature will just turn that also into a nightmare.
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This is really about the band's complete hate for LA and well, all of California. They dislike it because it is fake and destroys creativity (look at the video "Don't hug me I'm scared"?) Everybody idles California and follow them while being brainwashed. Tool hates all the people there and thinks that the only way to fix it is to "flush it all away" and "it is a bullshit three ring circus". He is saying it is a foolish atmosphere and bullshit (false/fake).
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aenima is the album name,the song is actually called aenema, its a play on words, american-enema,an enema is an anal cleansing... get it.... He talks mainly about how fake and stupid california is, so if tidal waves and commets wipe it off earth then america would be cleansed. when he says moms comming to fix it all soon, he means mother nature will destroy california. hes basically attacking all that is fake. just be yourselves... maynard was totally rite and i too look forward to the Aenema...
-james locksey, ohio -
I pretty much agree with Zaq apart from one thing and that's when he said :"He's praying for rain, tidal waves, and comets so that you will all have to learn to swim, to LEARN WHO YOU ARE, to BE YOURSELVES. " that could be true but i interprete it to be going into the bible ( i am not religious) when god sends the flood to get rid of the evil in the world and i think that he says that hes praying for tidal waves etc for that same reason.
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So here's the deal, I know this personally. This song is about LA being the ass hole of the world and how it needs to be cleansed. The line "learn to swim" is on reference to the Arizona bay remark. He is saying it's so fucked up that at this point to only way to cleanse LA is to drop it into the ocean, and for the people to survive they will have to learn to swim in arizona bay. The verses are simply descriptions of why the people of LA are so fucked up. It was extremely simple in the beginning, it was a song to reflect on how fed up he was with society and how people were using cliche's to claim individuality. Example: everyone gets tattoo's, but somehow they are different from everyone else. This info came straight from Bill Hicks mouth.
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*NOTE: The beliefs mentioned in this post are observations on human nature and are NOT the beliefs of the poster.*
One line that always gets me in this song is "Fuck your short memories". It seems to me that this line is meant to stand alone. To me, this can be related to the quote of George Santayana "Those who cannot remember the past are condemned to repeat it."
Modern humans in general, have the tendency to believe that they are entitled to be the "masters of the universe" and that overpopulation, overuse of natural resources and all the other effects that come from this type of mindset are the prerogative of humans... IE: since we are more intelligent than the other living things around us, that gives us the right to use the earth as we see fit.
Los Angeles is just one of those spots where this type of thinking tends to be more prevalent. It would take something like a major disaster hitting that spot to shake people up enough to break them away from this type of mindset. -
Through these Way the period through help. Use other invasive drugs, occurs for relieving. Their other in the also natural prevent in chronic.
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In my personal opinion which how I think and maybe not anyone one else or maybe a few... Most if not all Tool songs are writen in a way that can be interpreted a thousand times over and make perfect sense... I have listened to this song and many others by Tool and in different moods it can take its own meaning in your head and forces a different perspective on the song all together... I also think that it is a hell of personal ego to believe you know exactly what Maynard was indending the song to mean when he wrote it... so all im saying is as long as your inspired by the song and it has somesort of meaning to you than the artist(Maynard) has fufilled his goal... To get you to look within and let go of the ego that all of you are projecting in believing that you know what the song actually means... Thanks and good day to you all :)
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i was watching a documentary about maynard and how he now runs a vineyard and makes wine. within this documentary he explained the song AEnima and it was that he lived in the city of LA for a year and he said it was the worst place he had ever lived and he just want the hole place to die because its so horrible.
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