Analysis of Bruce Springsteen's Song Devils & Dust Essay

Erik Larson has organized The Devil in the White City chronologically, alternating between the construction of the 1893 Chicago World’s Fair and the evolution of a serial killer. In doing so, Larson is able to explore the details of the fair in-depth, while keeping the interest of the reader. By using this organizational structure, Larson is also able to tell the gruesome tale of a serial killer without scaring away his audience. Overall, the pairing of these two stories helps to balance out the novel.

He mentions the fight in the House of Representatives that broke out, in relation with the civil rights bill. He also about the equality between black and white people in the 1960’s. At this point this is being read the words “all is calm, all is bright” this completely contrast from the subject about racism but the song is representing a sense of tranquillity as if everything is okay when it is not.

Rage Against the Machine’s single "Testify", the first song from their 1999 album 'The Battle of Los Angeles", is a commentary on the American public’s blindness or numbness to global issues such as war, politics, capitalism, wealth, and power through the filtering of information by the mass news media. As it relates to Sociology, “Testify” deals mainly with Marxist Conflict Theory, and also incorporates many of the topics we have learned about in class throughout the semester.

The poem “The White Porch” by Cathy Song is an illustration of maturity and coming of age. There is an innocent tone to the beginning of the poem with sensual undertones as the writing progress’s. In the poem, a woman is reminiscing about her young womanhood as she sits on her porch awaiting her presumed lover. Song creates the character of the woman to be of a homemaker, describing her duties taking care of laundry, having a cake in the oven and snapping beans in her lap. Through the visualization that Song creates it is assumed that the woman is pregnant, and as she is waiting for her husband she thinks back to the things she herself used to do when she was younger with her own mother. She is reflecting on the way her mother raised her thinking about how she wants to raise her own child. The speaker admits to sneaking in her lover late at night behind her mother’s back, but does not seem to feel remorseful because all her decisions led to where she is in her life now. Cathy Songs poem “The White Porch” portrays the transition of a girl into a woman using symbolism, imagery and simile.

To begin, America has been through hell, but she always comes back. “Ragged Old Flag” was Cash’s response to the nationwide frustration brought on by the Vietnam War and Watergate Scandal. Johnny wanted to write a song that would make people feel patriotic and stand together during the Vietnam War and Watergate Scandal. “Ragged Old Flag” reaches many generations and that is apparent in the first couple of verses. Johnny Cash wrote “Ragged Old Flag” in first person point of view. The listener will be skillfully taken on a journey through the historical events of the United States. Within the first couple verses we are introduced to a man new to small town. He is walking by the courthouse when he notices an elderly man sitting on a bench. The man

McGuire is a famous songwriter and has been very successful through his song Eve Of Destruction. The poet's purpose of this poem is to connect to the readers that war is important and that we should cherish the world and what we have. Instead he is shameful that we don’t care. Therefore McGuire wants us as readers to realise and be thankful of the pain and suffering that people went through who fought for us and our countries. This poem has a big impact not just on McGuire himself but on the readers, as they are now aware of what is happening, and can be thankful of the freedom they have. Eve Of Destruction is very successful as it engages and interacts with the readers through the use of techniques such as metaphor, repetition, rhetorical

Ludacris does a remarkable job of portraying his message about the struggles that some adolescents are faced with. “Runaway Love”, by Ludacris, featuring Mary J. Blige (2007), represents the theme of struggle through hip-hop and rap music. It is about little girls who are “stuck up in the world on their own.” They have to take care of themselves because the people they are around do not care about them. They range from nine to eleven years in age, and their goal in life, at such a young age, is to run away from home. Ludacris is trying to get the listener to realize the struggles that even children have to face because adults are not the only ones who have problems, like most people believe. He is very successful in

The song “Atlantic City” by Bruce Springsteen tells the story of a couple, their love and how it has fallen apart as well as their debts. The man in the relationship is trying to get either his girlfriend or wife a new, better life. He wants to start over and due things the right way, having a strong relationship, a steady job and no debts. He wants to be able to buy her expensive things and be able to pay the bills and rediscover their love for one another ‘were going out where the sands turning to gold”. He thinks their love has died but can come back, “how everything dies baby that’s a fact/but maybe everything that dies someday comes back” which also connects to him self to a new task, that he may not survive while in “Atlantic City”.

Every song has a story to tell, and some contain hidden stories or lessons, while others are completely blatant. In Billy Joel’s song, “We Didn’t Start the Fire,” he does not hesitate to be very obvious with what he tries to prove, which is how all of the events in his song contribute to one large fire. I chose to remediate Joel’s song because it spoke to me with historical context. When researching the song, I read a majority of the history behind it and decided to reflect upon it in a visual picture collage, combining a majority of the elements he mentions with pictures--all circled around a fire in the middle. I decided to also make red-dyed cupcakes reflecting the fire Joel speaks of and ice them with a flame, yet placing an X over it,

This stanza a few repeats of literary devices we've already seen in earlier stanzas. Line 30 has another example of assonance using the words "around" and "frowns". Another repeat of a literary device is in line 33 with internal rhyme; "You shouldn't let other people get your kicks for you". There are two examples of metaphors with "the chrome horse" in line 34 and line 35, "who carried on his shoulder a Siamese cat". These strange, difficult to understand lyrics are very common in Dylan songs. Sometimes entire songs are made up of these vague metaphors, such as "It's All Right Ma, I'm Only Bleeding," and "It's a Hard Rain That's Gonna Fall".

This was sincerely the biggest eye opening independent film that I have ever seen. I know absolutely nothing about the Amish faith or people as I have never been exposed to them. Their strict way of life is backed by a very close knit family and strong religious beliefs. When teenagers in the Amish community turn sixteen they are free to explore the “English” world and they are exposed to everyday American life. Followers of the Amish religion believe that being exposed to the outside world is like being exposed to the Devil’s playground, hence the name of the film.

When delving into the song and trying to grasp the meaning, it can be understood that the author really desires to be free and go back home to where he belongs and desires. The author or writer of the song does not like the idea of slavery, nor does he like being a slave himself, his perspective on the topic shows that he is not happy about the current situation and no one should because of how cruel slavery is. The author also uses certain rhetorical strategies, one of them being metaphors. They can be used to explain his sadness and other feelings he has about the topic of slavery. An example of this is,

In the second stanza, Lorde paints the streets of New York in a grim image. “I am trapped on a desert of raw gunshot wounds…” This line could also mean that Lorde feels trapped in a society ruled by white male supremacy (the desert) that is still ongoing with no end in sight (raw gunshot wounds). This meaning is more probable because Lorde emphasizes in lines 11 and 12 of the second stanza “as it [the blood] sinks into the whiteness of the desert…” Next, Lorde makes her call for revenge for the brutality of Clifford Glover. She says that Glover is “…a dead child dragging his shattered black face off the edge of my sleep…” and that “…blood from his punctured cheeks and shoulders is the only liquid for miles…” Her “stomach churns” at

Northwestern students walking around campus in 2008 never knew that the screeching notes of guitar music thundering from Chris Danzig’s dorm would someday echo through their local movie theaters. Danzig, now a musician in San Francisco, is bass guitarist for the rock 'n' roll band, Down and Outlaws, whose music will appear in the upcoming film, Snowden. The song, selected from their debut album Above Snakes, will accompany the political thriller, written and directed by Academy Award Winner Oliver Stone, about the NSA contractor and classified information. “Every once in a while you get lucky, and this was one of those situations,” said Danzig about the producer’s decision to include the song. Luck is certainly one way to describe Danzig’s

This song starts off very much like the Jimi Hendrix guitar solo in Purple Haze. The difference in this piece is that it tones down a bit so you are able to hear the lyrics of the song although it still feels that the guitar is the “star” or solo of the song. I believe Janis Joplin is also the lead singer in this song and she has an amazing voice. It is a rough, blues feel and she could hit some high notes. Her style of singing is amazing.