|
|
Boulevard of Broken Dreams Song Meaning ( See Actual Lyrics)
A song like Boulevard of Broken Dreams has a lot of different meanings. It comes into the world with pre-established meanings, that existed even before it was written. It has the meaning the song writer and band originally intended. And then it has the meaning that ends up being created by the people who listen to it.
For Green Day's Boulevard of Broken Dreams, in particular, there has been a lot of controversy surrounding whether the song's meaning has been 'destroyed' by the massive media glut surrounding it. Whatever the answer to that question may be, there's no doubt that this song stands as a perfect example of how you can't judge a piece of art in isolation. It's affected by its history, and the history it, in turn, creates. You can't say, "Oh man, just listen to the lyrics, that's all that matters," because art, especially a super popular, widespread art form like music, doesn't exist in a void, you don't listen to in a void, and outside factors are going to affect its meaning, whether we like it or not.
To begin at the beginning, you've got to consider the preexisting connotations that come along with a song entitled Boulevard of Broken Dreams. It's not the first song with that name, of course. A song popularized by the likes of Tony Bennett, Nat King Cole, and Frank Sinatra of that same name came out in 1934.
Here's a few verses for that song:
You laugh tonight and cry tomorrow,
When you behold your shattered dreams.
And gigolo and gigolette
Awake to find their eyes are wet
With tears that tell of broken dreams.
Here is where you'll always find me,
Always walking up and down.
But I left my soul behind me
In an old cathedral town.
The interesting thing about the old Boulevard of Broken Dreams is that it was written about life around the Moulin Rouge in Paris, but it was made famous by American singers.
Boulevard of Broken Dreams is also the title of a famous biography about James Dean. In this case, we find the expression being applied as a metaphor to the tragedy of the demise of a great American star. There seems to be a unique American-ness to this expression, and you can see why when we consider the term "boulevard."
"Boulevard" was originally a term used to describe wide, elegant roads like those popularized by Parisian architects. These roads were usually a matter of civic pride, were very well maintained, and often led somewhere considered to be beautiful and significant, like a royal palace or, in Paris, the Champs-Élysées.
Later on, the term was adopted in America, primarily in California, Green Day's home state, to describe pretty much any old road, no matter how grimly laid out or insignificant. This was part of the whole "in the land of milk and honey, every street is a boulevard" American Dream philosophy that built many streets and towns meant to be paradises, but that ultimately wound up decaying mockeries of immigrant dreams of affluence and ease in the new world.
In fact, Wikipedia describes many of California's boulevards as single lane dirt roads that wind through the mountains into nowhere. "Lonely roads," certainly, "don't know where they go," indeed. Clearly not to a happy ending, and it is in this way that boulevards turn out to be quiet the tidy metaphor for the broken dream, and hence, the particularly American popularity of the expression.
The idea of the Boulevard of Broken Dreams probably seemed especially apt to Green Day when they started work on the "American Idiot" album. It's laughable now, but at that point, many music critics and listeners saw Green Day as being pretty much washed up. According to producer Rob Cavallo, they were all totally scattered, not playing music together or doing much of anything. Then they came together to give Green Day one last try.
Cavallo says that the beginnings of "American Idiot" were pretty wobbly. The guys didn't know how well they'd work together creatively, or if the chemistry would be right. No one was sure that they'd be able to pull it off.
It was around this point that Billie Joe came in to the studio with Boulevard of Broken Dreams. The song might seem ironic at this point, but at the time it spoke to how alone Green Day was as a band, with everyone seeing them as just another broken American dream, and even to how alone Billie Joe felt, unsure if the band could get their acts together and whip out that gangsta shit once again.
Boulevard of Broken Dreams also has a pivotal meaning within the context of the "American Idiot" album. As Sam Bayer showed in the Boulevard of Broken Dreams video, which acted as a sequel to Holiday, the song is about the giddy, dizzying rush of American Dreaming. You think anything's possible, that you're immortal, and you party, and you fuck around, and you massively over-consume, and then before you know it, it's a broken dream. Everything's wasted, tired, used up, and all the promise of the new world and a free, limitless society is revealed as being just another shitty scam.
This is the rough transition that happens to St. Jimmy once he heads out into the world. This is the story of American history, and clearly, based on the massive popularity of the song, this is the story of WAY too many people all over America and throughout the whole Americanized planet.
Along with all kinds of awesome rights and freedoms, America gave birth to the cult of the individual. The every man for himself, cover your own ass philosophy that has brought American society all the riches and all the misery it knows today. The "everything's alright" side of the coin is that each individual has rights, enjoys the privilege of being allowed to do whatever's necessary to survive and thrive, and gets to cut anyone's throat that gets in the way.
The "fucked up" side of the coin, however, is that people feel increasing isolated, lonely, rootless, and desperate, without recourse. Everyone's supposed to be able to take care of themselves, right? Everyone minds their own business, guards their hard-earned crap with a gun, and invites everyone else to do the same.
This is why the singer in Boulevard of Broken Dreams is so alone. Even though he might be in the heart of the city, he's trapped in his own mind, as are all the other broken dreamers around him. There's a city, but no community, no unity of feeling, and even though everybody wants to connect - "Sometimes I wish someone out there will find me" - it's impossible because everybody's so trapped in their own fucked up, depressed little worlds.
The big ironic tragedy of this song then becomes that all us fucked up, depressed assholes make Boulevard of Broken Dreams Green Day's biggest hit of all time, and a generally massive success, and it's like all these people getting together and saying "I'm lonely, I'm depressed, this sucks." But how can we be lonely if we're all together, and how can Green Day say they walk alone when they've become this gargantuan, universally beloved success? (You just know there's a bunch of Martians in some far off galaxy humming along and thinking of their own wretched existences on the intergalactic space highway of broken dreams).
And so the song meaning changes as it grows. A song about isolation, alienation, and loneliness can hardly maintain its same ring when cheerleaders are dancing to it at football games, and it's a favorite ring tone of 2005: "Yeah, I walk alone, and that's one of my girlfriends calling, I'm not sure which one."
A lot of people are sick of Boulevard of Broken Dreams. It's way over-played. Its meaning has been muddied and lost in the consumer crush. But consider this: when a song about alienation and misery has become a sort of unofficial national anthem, then maybe it is time to stop just listening to it, and start acting on it. Crawl out of your hole, break out of your personal introspective nightmare. Reach for other people. Stop walking the borderline and find each other. We're all out there, after all, singing the same sad, stupid songs.
|
|
