Elliot is one of those artists that even after years of listening to him and you think you've heard it all, you most certainly haven't. I found this song today and am blown away and happy that every couple weeks I find a hidden gem by Elliot that I can obsess over. Amazing music was just flowing out of this guy at all times during his life. One of the greatest artist of all time in my opinion.
If you’re interested, there’s a collection you can download online called The Grand Mal. It’s 9 discs worth of unreleased songs, rarities and alternate versions. This isn’t discarded material either. A lot of his best songs, including this one, can only be found on that album.
@@armanbadrlou7140 You're right! I mis-remembered-- mine is 8 discs too. There could potentially be another disc or two added of songs that were only played live, especially if covers were included. "You Make It Seem Like Nothing" and "My New Freedom" come to mind. I don't think either of those songs are on the Grand Mal.
I know what you mean but I may have gotten to a point where I've heard everything that's been released in some form or another, maybe like 99.9 percent. Been listening to consistently for 5 years
Why is it the smart,creative ,good people are the ones abused,the ones who struggle to keep it together,the ones that are painted as being the problem- meanwhile the abuser seems to live their life unscathed? How many black sheep kids grew up all fucked up, themselves painted as the problem,drugs,depression,jail- abuser shaking his head with rest of family and friends. The innocent always seem to be the ones who suffer. I only hope Karma comes into play somewhere down the line for all that hurt a child and never took responsibility when that child's adulthood came apart at the seams. They know in their heart who they are.
The more you lose trust in the people who are suppose to treat you right the more you feel the need to turn to something a lot more beautiful then your reality, like music. I think abusive behavior can further influence a person to express themselves through creative mediums. The more trust you lose in people and the world around you the more you just want to create a better reality through music. You're right creative people are abused but I believe the abuse itself makes people more insistent upon expressing themselves creatively.
its not just abuse of children either....14 years ago my 17 year marriage ended and suffice to say...narcissistic - military - sexual abuse ....only now am i beginning to understand... thank god for Elliott
It’s because there is no such thing as Karma. There is no right or wrong that’s mandated and enforced by simply being alive. We want to believe in it Bc were human and want to live and be happy and think that there’s justice. But in the words of Ned Ryerson, a character from ‘Groundhog Day’, “It’s all one big crapshoot, anywho”. All we can do is combat all the bad, Bc we know and recognize it, while hoping that we can evolve and chip away at it as a whole. But honestly it’s a battle that could go on longer than the longevity of life on Earth.
It's cause genuinely creative people live with their nerves hanging out and even trivial shit kills them, It feeds their brilliance, helps them to create work we treasure, but ultimately destroys them...
this song lives somewhere in my heart, somewhere very deep, very well hidden, very quiet, somewhere i never talk about, somewhere dark. but it says everything i would ever want to say
He always had a special knack for making apathy and entropy a beautiful. Take care of yourself friends and for those who are feeling alone, I promise you aren't and take comfort in knowing that the same hurt/loneliness that you may be feeling was also felt by our pal Elliott Smith . Unbelievably talented musician and a kind soul as well
Now that everybody's worn the expression Not that you wanted to use It seems untrue now But the funniest thing is It fits you now To a perfect T You may never understand this affliction Although you feel the effects you feel Bruised now, body and mind you feel Used now, almost all of the time Been abused Abused Abused Sunday morning in the aisle with my brother Watching the men in black tell the youths how You're supposed to behave, and tell the truth now You don't know what you're saying We've been abused Abused Abused Abused Abused Abused Abused Other people see some evil intention But the closer you get The more you get confused how Why does everyone know Been abused now Didn't want it to show
@@javedalam5549 But of course friend after all an Elliott Smith song which means that every single lyric is permanently set to "stun" if you catch my drift. Hell even his instrumentals have been equipped with lyrics better than most other musicians! He had an amazing ability to phrase things that have emotional impact far greater than the sun of their parts. If you can't tell I'm a big fan of the things that he did. We truly miss you brother and I only wish that he had his own "Elliott Smith" to help him through the hardest parts of life. I hope that this makes sense to others
A younger me tried to compress this song to make it easier to hear. Now I realize that the point is to turn it up at the beginning and leave it up at the end.
No body talks about the every day abuse some people are subjected to. Some people are sensitive. Somebody people are deeply injured by a lie from a trusted friend or a cutting remark delivered for no other reason than to hurt. People are trained not to talk about physical abuse so to talk about the common place abuse that some are subjected to, even for decades, seems like an admission of a terrible weakness and they fear, rightly so, that the wrong people might overhear. When I hear this song I think about those long suffering people who dare not speak for fear of further abuse.
Don't be a pussy. The truly brave embrace the vulnerability. I'm talking to you as much as I am myself 8 years ago when I lost the best woman I've ever known because of macho shit like this. You'll be hurt, homie. That's unavoidable. But shutting that door now because it's better feeling nothing at all makes it near impossible to reopen it when the right one comes along. Much love.
Wow, someone really fucked him up in his childhood. So sad that these beautiful songs are the only light left of him. The world will bleed for ages due to this loss.
Yeah I heard about that, and what's even more fucked up that he then apologized to him and tried to reach out to him, I bet that really stirred things up and brought out the repressed trauma. Fucked up.
@Gracie Rose Not speculations, accusations by Elliott that he was physically and sexually abused. Apparently the step dad denied the charges of sexual abuse, but apologized for being too hard on Elliott. That suggests to me the physical abuse at least is true. I’ve seen some people suggest these accusations need to be taken with a grain of salt because all the drugs can mess up your mind. I don’t know if there is truth to that.
@@seanmatthewking Thing is that people tend to deny it when they actually have sexually abused someone. That's kind of how it works, when someone does something that most people recognize as wrong, they deny and hide it. So, his step-father would deny it if he didn't abuse Elliott, but he also would deny it if he did abuse Elliott.
@@seanmatthewkingguys wouldn't normally accuse if it was untrue there's so much stigma and he had signs of being afflicted including using substances to block stuff out they say some people have false memories but I doubt that applies to elliott
I used to listen to this song before I actually knew I had been abused, but this song resonated with me. I must have had an inkling of what had and was happening to me. Elliott has always spoken to parts of me that I didn't understand until much later.
+patrick True love is on Heaven adores you or something, but I do agree. It would have been better on the Basement one.. They should just make another album and add a whole bunch of unreleased songs on it, it would be awesome!
One of my favourites from Elliot: the lyrics are heartbreaking and relatable, his voice is so tender and knowing. It's almost like a lullaby. Rest in peace man
Same. been playing guitar since 97, I learned guitar by listening to The Beatles, Phish, Radiohead(and more). Then in like 2004-5 I finally heard of him. Then he was my guy. and is.
@A Keithing Never listened to Phish, but the Beatles, Radiohead, and Elliott are 3 of my favorites. Musical artists who never miss. I guess that’s not so unique on a Elliott Smith video, considering we’re here for him, and the Beatles and Radiohead are insanely popular bands-not to mention they kind of represent the light and dark of Elliott. I remember hearing a story of someone meeting Elliott at a Radiohead concert. And you can just hear the Beatles influence, as well as see it in the many songs he chose to cover by the Beatles and their members.
Elliott's beauty came from his inner damage. Throughout the world people listen to his music and realise someone else put their feelings into music. I miss him, though we never met. I miss him so much
I don't agree that his beauty was because of his inner damage, but rather his ability to express it so beautifully & honestly. I've never found an artist since Elliott who is able to create such wonderfully angelic, melodic & bitter-sweet hymns from so abhorrent inspiration material. I truly believe he was the best songwriter of my lifetime.
True thats why no-one can judge anyone. The only way to break the cycles is to try and forgive and be thankful for all that you have and act on any wisdom and truth that you discover that can take you outside of vicious circles. The difficulty with abuse that happens to people is not continuing the abuse by beating yourself up and judging yourself. it like cuddling the wounded child within and telling him or her that they deserve to be loved. take care hope things are better for you
The advice to forgive and be grateful and that forgiveness was the way out -- maybe even the only way out -- of my cptsd was the most damaging I ever got. I would go into my mind and try and take up a benevolent attitude towards my abusers, the people beating and torturing and molesting me, in my intrusive memories of them, and would end up empathizing with them taking their side and even merging with them in these memories, abandoning myself over and over again, plunging deeper and deeper into confusion and terror watching myself empathizing with an adult molesting me while I was being molested and thinking my anger was the problem and the dangerous thing. It almost destroyed me. Please stop telling people this.
Also asking the survivor to focus on forgiving creates so many problems for them as they go on in life, because again it makes them feel their anger is the problem, which was usually the message while we were being abused anyway, whereas anger is actually protective and was the part of us taking our side and saying 'this is not okay.' Especially when the abuser is the caretaker that's the part that goes offline and gets abandoned. The advice to forgive kept me in stockholm syndrome for decades as it has many other survivors, and I found myself repeatedly in abusive relationships thinking the onus was on me not to be mad at abusers and let them off the hook. I have seen this with every woman I've ever met who was hit by their significant other: they all think it's their job not to be mad and empathize with the person beating them and also explain why they're not so innocent either; all the same coping mechanisms they had to use with their fathers who hit them. Again, anger is the appropriate response to being abused and the first step in the process is to be able to hold our anger and listen to it. Only THEN can we actually extricate ourselves from abusive cycles and not repeat them. We have to learn to take our OWN sides. The advice to forgive comletely circumvents this.
This song has really come along from the version I first heard. Whoever took this song back to remastered or whatever really knew what they were doing and really put some TLC into cleaning it up. This song so terribly sad and at the same time it is achingly beautiful all at once. It’s the kind of song that shows why Art is such a powerful, yet fundamentally mercurial thing. We can never Really know why we make Art and we may never know why some pieces of Art actually resonate with a the energy of the person who makes it. That resonance, that energy, remains encapsulated in a pieces of Art forever, or at least as long as there are people who can feel the resonanc....even long after the artist is dead.
one of Elliot's many hidden gems. I think about this this song a lot. I think it provides a lot of catharsis for abused kids that a lot of artists these days can't deliver.
sunday morning in the aisle with my brother watching the men in black tell the youths how youre supposed to behave and tell the truth now, you don't know what you're saying. we've been abused abused abused abused abused abused abused ....says so much through repetition. says even more that the guy that abused him didn't want this song on the last album so it didn't make the cut. too fucking sad...
Elliott had this way of making such a fucked up song that was also so great musically that you have to go back to it, even when it can get uncomfortable
i avoided this song for the longest & barely even acknowledged it to me, but it was something like oh jeez an Elliott song called Abused, oh bother, o brother. but i should have known better after all this time. of course it defies expectation and he's making me think all sorts of ways again. idk how to explain it but check the lyrics. this is so interesting
*rubs hands together* Okay so what you do is you find someone willing to send you the Grand Mal collection. Then you devote a lot of time to your headphones.
Check the subreddit. If you search "grand mal" in there you'll find a post with a link to a Dropbox folder with all of the Grand Mal Studio Rarities stuff uploaded. Eight "disks" or so worth of unreleased material. Hope this helps :)
Does anyone know when he wrote this? Was it an early work or late or around the time of his murder? It sounds a little like "from a basement on a hill", "figure 8" and a little "either/or" combined to make this piece. One of his most beautiful ones yet. I hope we keep finding more gorgeous and beautiful gems like these. Anyway, I hope another Ferdinand fan can answer this question. Rest in peace Elliott.💕🎵
Without going into to much detail, I believe Elliott Smith was murdered. I've done extensive research on th subject, read a lot of articles and viewed a lot of interviews. One of the most persuasive findings was in the med examiner's report on Smith's autopsy, which read that he had cuts on his arms which could mean he was trying to protect himself, his toxicology report came clean, and he was at a really good mindset in his life. He had given up red meat, caffeine, alcohol ect. And started a healthier lifestyle. He was also really excited about the new album he was working on. This is my opinion. Thanks for letting me share it.😀
Lego Boy Fanatic Ok, that’s fine. But who wanted him dead? What’s the motive? I’d love to believe you’re correct. Same with the mysterious “murders” of Sam Cooke, JFK, Malcolm Little, Kirk Cobain, et al.
Pete Krebs abused Elliott Smith? And so did Jennifer Chiba? And many others did, too? And they all murdered him, others, attempted to kill me (still are), and are still attempting to kill others?
I've been listening to his almost phoney sadness for two decade. But going through cold turkey methadone withdrawal, his suicid finally hit me. Shattered
I see why it wasn't. It wasn't near finished. The levels are off, the vocal melodies aren't quite there yet...it's obvious that this was a rough draft of a rough draft. Don't get me wrong i adore this song as an instrumental and I know that had this track been finished it would have been in my top 3 favorite Elliott smith songs.
Seems finished to me, barring a final mix, which isn't indicative of the actual song being unfinished. Saying the melodies feel unfinished feels pretty speculative, too, and I can't say I agree.
Sounds higher quality than Speed Trials to me and was recorded around the same time. Personally I like the ‘rougher’ style of Either/Or and songs like this one, but I can see why one might wish for a cleaner sound too.
“Sunday morning in the aisle with my brother Watching the men in black tell the youths How you’re supposed to behave and tell the truth You don’t know what you’re saying, we’ve been abused Abused, abused, abused, abused, abused, abused.” This song is about more than one soul’s experience.
@@Ethan-fh9lq Theres an implication about his brother being in the same boat there too. Childhood friends have implicated an abuser from outside the family also. awfully sad.
@@mariannatrench5677 Yeah, it's really heart breaking just to think about. And frustrating too. I was just trying to responding to the idea that this song is purely autobiographical though. Elliott Smith wasn't Catholic and didn't have a brother. So I was saying this song is not just about what happened to one person, Elliott or anyone else.
he was? I think it's pretty common that abused people become abusers, dad's dad beat him up, dad beats me up kind of thing. I just didn't know Elliott Smith abused anyone
