Can the lonely take the place of you?

I’ve already analyzed a song by Christina Perri, so below the post should be down there somewhere.

                This week Im reviewing the Lonely, a song off of Perri’s album Lovestrong., her only album (so far, anyway). Perri spent more time in the studio deciding what songs to put on the album than actually writing the songs, because the songs presented and their order was so important to her.

                The song’s tune brings about a gloomy feeling around. The piano’s rhythm is fast, but the minor key is what makes it sad. “Two am, where do I begin? Crying off my face again” this is referring to when she was driving home one night after recording. She stayed late at the studio and on her way home at 2 am, she had to stop the car and decided to grab a milkshake to cheer her up. I eat chocolate when I am sad. Milkshakes are cold. I don’t like being cold when I’m sad. “The lonely” that she refers to is a past lover or a dead family member, or maybe something like a monster that comes to her and scares her back into bed (“The silent sounds of loneliness want to follow me to bed”). “I’m the ghost of a girl that I want to be most, a shell of a girl that I use to know well.” The Lonely monster took her previous life and now she feels like the remains of someone, as if now she is half a person.

                “Too afraid to go inside, for the fear of one more loveless night. ‘Cause the loneliness will stay with me, and hold me until I fall asleep.” Here the lonely is taking care of her, the depression lulling her to sleep. Because she is so caught up with her illness, she is too afraid to love again or go out and meet new people, like someone refusing to drive after a bad car accident.  “Broken pieces of a barely breathing story, where there once was love, now there’s only me. And the lonely.”  This break up tore her life apart and left her all alone. This reinforces my thought of the lonely is a hole left by a break up. Go me.

                It almost seems like she is unsure of the lonely herself. Is it helping her? Protecting her from another heart break? Or is it impairing her, keeping her away from trying again? 

The lyric video:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HO4e4nCYBEo