During the spring of my freshman year of college, I stayed up late a lot, usually on really rainy nights it seemed, and talked to people on IRC chats who I knew through a music forum. I was on the east coast so even though it was really late for me, after all kinds of other activities, it wasn’t as late for people in other time zones. We talked about music, books and movies, music, our lives, music, the meaning of life, the future of the universe, and more music.

Around this same time, I really got into Counting Crows. I had never paid them all that much attention to them in the “Mr. Jones” heyday but a college friend lent me “August and Everything After” and “This Desert Life” and I was instantly enamored. There are so many great songs on those albums.

My first favorite was “Anna Begins,” and still is probably my all-time fave. I can sense a post about that song coming on at a future time. I’m a sucker for songs that tell a story, and this one is just so good. But there were others, like “Perfect Blue Buildings,” “Raining in Baltimore,” “High Life,” “Speedway,” “Sullivan Street.” and another one of my most favoritest, “A Murder of One.”Just listing off the names of thsoe songs brings me back to March and April of 2000.

One night in IRC chat with my music forum friends, I was talking about Counting Crows, not sure if anyone else would be a fan. One of my friends replied that she had once been driving with a friend at night and they spent hours discussing the title “A Murder of One.” That seemed so dreamy and contemplative and perfect to me.

Here are the lyrics:

Blue morning, Blue morning
Wrapped in strands of fist and bone.
Curiosity, Kitten, doesn’t have to mean you’re on your own.
Your can look outside your window,
He doesn’t have to know.
We can talk a while, baby.
We can take it nice and slow.

All your life is such a shame, shame, shame.
All your love is just a dream, dream, dream.

Well, are you happy where you’re sleepin’?
Does he keep you safe and warm?
Does he tell you when you’re sorry?
Does he tell you when you’re wrong?
I’ve been watching you for hours.
It’s been years since we were born.
We were perfect when we started…
I’ve been wondering where we’ve gone.

All your life is such a shame, shame, shame.
All your love is just a dream, dream, dream.

Well, I dreamt I saw you walking up a hillside in the snow
Casting shadows on the winter sky as you stood there counting crows.
One for sorrow,
Two for joy,
Three for girls and four for boys,
Five for silver,
Six for gold,
Seven for a secret never to be told.

There’s a bird that nests inside you
Sleeping underneath your skin.
Yeah, when you open up your wings to speak
I wish you’d let me in.

All your life is such a shame, shame, shame.
All your love is just a dream, dream, dream.
Open up your eyes
You can see the flames, flames, flames.
of your wasted life.
You should be ashamed.

Yeah, you don’t want to waste your life, baby.
You don’t wanna waste your life, now darlin.
You don’t wanna waste your life, baby.
You don’t wanna waste your life, now darlin.
Oh, you don’t wanna waste your life, now babe.
I said you don’t wanna waste your life, now darlin.
Oh, you don’t wanna waste your life, now baby.
Oh, you don’t wanna, you don’t wanna waste your life, now darlin.
Change, change, change.
Change.
Change.
Change.

I walk along these hillsides in the summer ‘neath the sunshine.
I am feathered by the moonlight falling down on me.

I said I walk along these hillsides in the summer ‘neath the sunshine.
I am feathered by the moonlight falling down on me.

I said I will walk along these hillsides in the summer ‘neath the sunshine.
I am feathered by the moonlight falling down on me.

I said I will walk along these hillsides in the summer ‘neath the sunshine.
I am fettered by the moonlight.

change, change, change.
change, change, change.
Yeah.
change, change, change.
Oh, change, change.
Y-y-y-y-y-yeah.
Change, change, change. (4X)

The title could have a lot of meanings. There’s murder as in group of crows, or murder as in murder. Is it supposed to one crow traveling alone (like a flock of one or something), or a murder of an individual? It does seem to represent both in terms of the lyrics. It’s definitely about a person whose spirit is dying in some sort of unhealthy relationship, someone who needs to be encouraged to “change, change, change.” It could be interpreted as this person’s spirit being murdered. Or it could be loneliness, the single crow. And what does it mean that when counting crows, the “one” is for sorrow?

You kinda have to figure that all these layers of meaning are significant. After, the band took their name from these lyrics. I would’ve loved to be part of that conversation, driving around at night, somewhere kinda nature-y where you can really see the moon, discussing all the possible meanings and symbolism in “A Murder of One.”

I’ve always associated this idea of discussing a song for hours into the night with this song. But if given the choice of any song in the world to do this with, I’ll have to get back to you.

Do you know what song YOU would want to discuss into the night? And what part would you want to discuss? Would it be the title, a single line, the lyrics as a whole? Something else entirely? If you could pick just one song to really delve into and have a profound discussion about, which would it be?

~EJ