An Update to my Shrine | Songs - Let Down by Radiohead
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The first time I heard "Let Down," it was at a very low point in my life where I felt so isolated, the only person I had was my partner. It made me resonate with feelings I could never articulate verbally or in a written way, a feeling I had once felt so much rage before finally mellowing out, becoming crushing, and then needing to remove yourself but unable to because of some other external connection or reason. The song's themes of modern disconnection and the relentless pace of life resonated with me during this period of significant transition, where the only dreams I had of were killing a previous iteration of myself.
The juxtaposition between the soaring, beautiful instrumentation and the deeply melancholic lyrics creates an emotional tension that perfectly captures what it means to feel simultaneously hopeful and disappointed- unafraid of moving forward, having felt stronger emotions before, and simply "hanging around" while staying dissapointed, feeling like a crushed bug. I've returned to this song countless times as of recent, even debating making a VRChat music video of it, and I keep finding new layers and meanings as my own life experiences have evolved.
What makes "Let Down" special is how it transforms this profound feeling of sadness into something transcendent. When Thom Yorke sings "one day I am gonna grow wings," there's a desperate optimism there that I've always found propels me into a sense of momentum, movement, rather than staying down. A belief that even amid crushing disappointment, something beautiful might still emerge, that you might even prove them wrong- that you will become everything that you told them you would be, without them.
In a more personal sense, I miss some friends that I no longer talk to. Or, I miss the old versions of them. It's not very often you find out that one of your friends did somethign deplorable and horrible while you were friends with them, or you experienced it firsthand yourself, and then have to speak up about it, otherwise you feel this crushing sense of guilt and dissapointment. You debate for days, weeks, months about how to express your feelings of disaspointment, finding yourself just lingering and hanging around. You have to make sure you don't get sentimental when you let off that bomb of pain, that chemical reaction that's full of hysteria of being free from the guilt, but it ends up being useless when nobody decides to listen to you. That feeling of betrayal of nobody listening to you, of being let down, sends you spiraling. The people that goaded you on, the people that were supposed to have your back, turn on you despite encouraging your behavior, as they simply wanted to see you go down instead of helping you. After isolation, you find new people- and those people believe you, and help you spread your wings again.