Chào các bạn,

Chiếc đĩa hát bật lên và giọng hát cất lên nhẹ và chậm:

“A long, long time ago
I can still remember how that music used to make me smile”

Như thế bắt đầu lời kể của nhạc sĩ / ca sĩ Don Mclean về một lịch sử âm nhạc nước Mỹ qua bài hát nổi tiếng “American Pie”. Bài hát được sáng tác vào năm 1971 và đứng ở vị trí số 1 ở Mỹ trong bốn tuần liên tiếp vào năm 1972.

Bài hát kể về thời kỳ lịch sử gì vậy? Tại sao bài hát nổi tiếng đến thế?

American Pie kể về lịch sử  của nước Mỹ qua hai thập niên 1950s và 1960s được thể hiện qua nhạc rock’n’roll.

+ Thập niên 1950s với niềm lạc quan phơi phới của một nước Mỹ thắng trận trước phát xít Đức và hưởng lợi  sau chiến tranh thế giới lần thứ 2. Đây là thời kỳ Baby Boomers, thời kỳ dựng xây nước Mỹ mới. Âm nhạc phản ánh niềm vui của đất nước, nhạc của Buddy Holly, Elvis Presley, and Bill Haley and the Comets đem niềm vui rộn rã.

+ Sự chuyển tiếp sang thập niên 1960s u tối

Sinh năm 1949 sau thế chiến thứ 2, Don Mclean chứng kiến sự thay đổi của nước Mỹ theo chiều hướng xấu đi. Một câu bé giao báo vào năm 1959s,  anh Don đọc được tin tức về vụ máy bay thảm khốc làm chết đi 3 nhạc sĩ nổi tiếng thời đó là Buddy Holly, Ritchie Valens, The Big Bopper (Jiles Perry Richardson, Jr.). Rồi sự qua đời của cha của anh, tuổi trưởng thành của anh bắt đầu như thế. Cao điểm là vụ ám sát tổng thống Kennedy vào năm 1963, bắt đầu thời kỳ khó khăn hơn cho cả nước Mỹ với phong trào dân quyền, chiến tranh Việt Nam..

Đứng ở thập niên 1970 nhìn lại lịch sử  với cảm xúc mãnh liệt của anh khi là một cậu bé bán báo đọc tin thần tượng âm nhạc Buddy Holly bị tai nạn (the day the music dies), Don Mclean viết American Pie như một bài thơ liên kết các sự kiện lịch sử/âm nhạc của hai thập niên lại trong một cảm xúc xuyên suốt.

Lời của bài hát American Pie chứa đầy những ẩn dụ bí hiểm. Đó là một sự ẩn dụ kinh khủng mà không có lời giải thích trực tiếp từ  tác giả. Rất rất nhiều sự kiện được nói đến trên tấm thảm hoa American Pie.

American Pie, bánh Pie nước Mỹ là gì? Một cái bánh rất ngon, như anh Don Mclean trả lời “ngon như là bạn không phải làm việc nữa, chỉ cần hưởng thụ cuộc sống”. Nhưng Bye bye American Pie, tạm biệt lý tưởng và đối diện với thực tế. Lịch sử diễn ra như thế 🙂

American Pie là một bài hát mang tính giáo dục rất cao về văn hóa Mỹ.  Dự án giáo dục “Songs of the Century” xếp American Pie ở thứ hạng số 5. Chúng ta cùng tìm hiểu kỹ nhé. Để tìm hiểu, mình post ở phần lời nhạc dưới đây một cố gắng giải thích về ca từ  của bài hát.

Dưới đây chúng ta có hai video. Video đầu tiên do Don Mclean trình diễn vào thập niên 70s và video thứ hai do Madonna hát lại bài hát vào năm 2000. Tiếp theo sau là lời nhạc và một giải thích về lời nhạc.

Các bạn quan tâm tới ý nghĩa của lời nhạc có thể đọc thêm ở một số website dưới đây. Nếu các bạn phát hiện ra thêm gì hay, các bạn comment cho rôm rả nhé 🙂

“What is Don McLean’s song “American Pie” all about?”
“Understanding American Pie”
“The Ultimate American Pie Website”
và các tìm kiếm khác trên Google.

Chúc các bạn một ngày American Pie 🙂

Hiển
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Don McLean –  American Pie
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Madonna – American Pie
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American Pie

By Don McLean

A long, long time ago I can still remember how that music used to make me smile
And I knew if I had my chance
That I could make those people dance
And maybe they’d be happy for a while. ¹

But February made me shiver
With every paper I delivered,
Bad news on the door step,
I couldn’t take one more step, ²

I can’t remember if I cried
When I read about his widowed bride ³
But something touched me deep inside,
The day, the music, died. ⁴
So…

Refrain:
Bye, bye Miss American Pie ⁵
Drove my Chevy to the levee but the levee was dry ⁶
Them good ol’ boys were drinkin’ whiskey ‘n’ rye ⁷
Singin this will be the day that I die.
This will be the day that I die. ⁸

Did you write the book of love ⁹
And do you have faith in God above,
If the bible tells you so. ¹⁰
And do you believe in rock ‘n’ roll?
Can music save your mortal soul? ¹¹
And can you teach me how to dance real slow?

Well I know that you’re in love with him
Cuz I saw you dancin’ in the gym. ¹²
You both kicked off your shoes ¹³
And I dig those rhythm and blues. ¹⁴

I was a lonely teenage bronkin’ buck
With a pink carnation and a pick up truck ¹⁵
But I knew I was out of luck,
The day, the music, died.
I started singin…

Refrain

Now for ten years we’ve been on our own ¹⁶
And moss grows fat on a rollin stone ¹⁷
But that’s not how it used to be,
When the jester sang for the king and queen
In a coat he borrowed from James Dean ¹⁸
And a voice that came from you and me. ¹⁹

Oh and while the king was looking down,
The jester stole his thorny crown ²⁰
The courtroom was adjourned;
No verdict was returned. ²¹

And while Lennon read a book on Marx, ²²
The quartet practiced in the park ²³
And we sang dirges in the dark, ²⁴
The day, the music, died.
We were singin’…

Refrain

Helter Skelter in a summer swelter ²⁵
The birds flew off with a fallout shelter,
Eight miles high and fallin’ fast. ²⁶
It landed foul on the grass. ²⁷
The players tried for a forward pass ²⁸
With the jester on the sidelines in a cast. ²⁹

Now the half-time air was sweet perfume ³⁰
While the sergeants played a marching tune. ³¹
We all got up to dance
Oh but we never got the chance. ³²

As the players tried to take the field
The marching band refused to yield.
Do you recall what was revealed, ³³
the day, the music, died?
We started singin’…

Refrain

Oh and there we were all in one place, ³⁴
A generation lost in space
With no time left to start again. ³⁵
So come on, Jack be nimble, Jack be quick. ³⁶
Jack Flash sat on a candle stick ³⁷
Because fire is the devils only friend.³⁸

Oh and as I watched him on the stage,
My hands were clinched in fists of rage,
No angel born in hell
Could break that Satan’s spell. ³⁹

And as the flames climbed high into the night
To light the sacrificial rite
I saw Satan laughing with delight,⁴⁰
The day, the music, died.
He was singin’…

Refrain

I met a girl who sang the blues ⁴¹
And I asked her for some happy news
But she just smiled and turned away. ⁴²
I went down to the sacred store
Where I’d heard the music years before
But the man there said the music wouldn’t play. ⁴³

And in the streets the children screamed, ⁴⁴
The lovers cried, and the poets dreamed. ⁴⁵
But not a word was spoken,
The church bells all were broken. ⁴⁶

And the three men I admire most,
The Father, Son, and the Holy Ghost, ⁴⁷
They caught the last train for the coast, ⁴⁸
The day, the music, died.
And they were singin’…

Refrain

They were singin’…

Bye, bye Miss American Pie
Drove my Chevy to the levee but the levee was dry
Them good ol’ boys were drinkin’ whiskey ‘n’ rye
Singin’ this will be the day that I die.

1. The song is about the history of rock and roll music and how it changed after Buddy Holly’s death. It is also, however, about McLean’s growing up, and his love of the pure rock and roll of the ’50s. McClean was a musician. He wanted to make people dance. Most 50’s music was meant for dancing and in general upbeat and happy, in contrast to 60’s music.

2. McClean was a paperboy on February 3, 1959 when Buddy Holly’s plane crashed. He was devastated by the news, since Holly was his idol.

3. Holly’s recent bride was pregnant when the crash took place; she had a miscarriage shortly afterward.

4. The same plane crash that killed Buddy Holly also took the lives of Richie Valens (“La Bamba”) and The Big Bopper (“Chantilly Lace”). Since all three were so prominent at the time, February 3, 1959 became known as “The Day The Music Died.”

5. Goodbye to the music of America, the Rock ‘n’ Roll and dance music of the ’50s. It’s interesting how McLean has feminized 50’s rock music here, the fact that it’s a virgin (Miss) form of music that’s as American as apple pie.

6. Chevy represents America. The Levee is the bar where McLean and his friends hung out in his hometown of New Rochelle, NY. It closed down.

7. This line is a play on words. Rye is a city in New York near where McLean grew up. When the Levee closed, the “good ol’ boys,” McLean and his friends, fled to drink in Rye where together they mourned the deaths of the trio.

8. One of Holly’s hits was “That’ll be the Day”; the chorus contains the line, “That’ll be the Day that I Die.”

9. “The Book of Love” by the Monotones; hit in 1958.

10. In 1955, Don Cornell did a song entitled “The Bible Tells Me So.” This line could also refer to the sense of disparity that maybe God let us down after the assassination of John Kennedy and the general disillusionment of the early ’60s. It is also likely that these lines are meant to garnish rock ‘n’ roll with religious imagery, because most of the early musicians, including Holly, got their start in church choirs or by singing hymns. An old children’s hymn called “Jesus Loves Me” has the line “the Bible tells me so” in the lyrics.

11. This is a lament of the decline of the dance music of the ’50s. It might also be a reference to The Lovin’ Spoonful’s hit in 1965 with John Sebastian’s “Do you Believe in Magic?” Or, McLean might be questioning the integrity of music and it’s worth after the plane crash

12. Dancing slow was an important part of early rock and roll dance events — but declined in importance through the 60’s as things like psychedelia and the 10-minute guitar solo gained prominence. Back then, dancing was an expression of love, and carried a connotation of commitment. Dance partners were not so readily exchanged as they would be later. Allegorically, the “him” is probably all the young, hansom teen idols that were common in the late ’50s and early ’60s. The “you” represents all the teenage girls who swooned over those idols.

13. A reference to a “sock hop,” generally held in gymnasiums.

14. McLean is letting us know he prefers the R&B music of the ’50’s to the sock hop music.

15. “A White Sport Coat (And a Pink Carnation),” was a hit for Marty Robbins in 1957. McLean was lonely because his music was out of style.

16. It was roughly 10 years after the death of Buddy Holly that McLean started writing “American Pie.”

17. The “rolling stone” is a reference to Bob Dylan, since “Like a Rolling Stone” (1965) was his first major hit; he was busy writing songs extolling the virtues of simple love, family and contentment while staying at home and raking in the royalties. It also is a reference to The Rolling Stones, and a symbollic reversal of the aphorism, “A rolling stone gathers no moss.” To McLean, the music of the ’60s was gathering moss–growing stale. “That’s not how it used to be” refers to the early days of Dylan.

18. The jester is Bob Dylan. The king could refer to Elvis. The Queen is probably the Queen of England, whom Dylan performed for. In the movie “Rebel Without a Cause”, James Dean has a red windbreaker that holds symbolic meaning throughout the film. In one particularly intense scene, Dean lends his coat to a guy who is shot and killed; Dean’s father arrives, sees the coat on the dead man, thinks it’s Dean, and loses it. On the cover of “The Freewheelin’ Bob Dylan”, Dylan is wearing just such as red windbreaker, and is posed in a street scene similar to one shown in a well-known picture of James Dean. Bob Dylan played a command performance for the Queen and Prince Consort of England. He was not properly attired, so perhaps this is a reference to his apparel.

19. A reference to Dylan’s style of music, folk music, from the people (you and me).

20. This could be a reference to Elvis’s decline and Dylan’s ascendance. (i.e. Presley is looking down from a height as Dylan takes his place.) The thorny crown might be a reference to the price of fame, or another religious metaphor.

21. This could be the trial of the Chicago Seven. It could also refer to the aftermath of the Kennedy assassination, which really had no “verdict,” and is still open to speculation. Most likely, it is a reference to the fact that there really is no true “king” of rock ‘n’ roll during this period. For even though Dylan has grabbed (stolen) the mantle of rock’s spokesman, the verdict is still out.

22. This is a play on words. Literally, John Lennon reading about Karl Marx; figuratively, the introduction of radical politics into the music of the Beatles. Both Lennon and Lenin (Soviet dictator) believed in Marxist philosophy.

23. Allegorically, this line probably refers to the time when the Beatles were still playing in England and Europe. They were still “practicing” because they had not come to America yet.

24. A “dirge” is a funeral or mourning song, so perhaps this is meant literally, morning the death of Holly or his music…or, perhaps, this is a reference to some of the new “art rock” groups which played long pieces not meant for dancing. It’s likely just a reference to McLean’s unhappiness with the way music was going.

25. “Helter Skelter” is a Beatles song which appears on the “White Album.” Charles Manson, claiming to have been “inspired” by the song led his followers in the Tate-LaBianca murders. The “summer swelter” might be a reference to the “Summer of Love” or perhaps to the “long hot summer” of Watts.

26. The Byrd’s “Eight Miles High” was on their late 1966 release “Fifth Dimension”. It was one of the first records to be widely banned because of supposedly drug-oriented lyrics.

27. One of the Byrds was busted for possession of marijuana.

28. The football metaphor could be the Rolling Stones, i.e. they were waiting for an opening which really didn’t happen until the Beatles broke up. Or it could refer to attempts of other musicians to come into the limelight while Dylan was laid up.

29. On July 29, 1966, Dylan crashed his Triumph 55 motorcycle while riding near his home in Woodstock, New York. He spent nine months in seclusion while recuperating from the accident.

30. Drugs, or the hidden messages about drugs in some of the songs of the mid-’60s (half-time in the decade).

31. A clear reference to Sergeant Pepper’s Lonely Hearts Club Band, the Beatles 1967 album that changed rock ‘n’ roll forever. It was the first theme album, the first to put lyrics on the cover, the first to use synthetic sounds. It had no hit singles, another new concerpt in album production. It had proported hidden messages, mostly drug messages in songs like “Lucy in the Sky with Diamonds (LSD). McLean liked it (sweet perfume).

32. All the youth got into this album. They didn’t get the chance to dance because the Beatles had now pushed rock music away from its dance roots. They used orchestras. They wrote long, slow songs with ponderous rhythms. Or it could also refer to the fact that the Beatles’ 1966 Candlestick Park concert lasted only 35 minutes.

33. No one could compete against the Beatles. Some folks think this refers to either the 1968 Demomcratic Convention or Kent State. What was “revealed” was the dark underlying messages of rock music: the Marxism that was alluded to in the previous verse, the advocation of drug use, the overly self-obsessed quality of the lyrics.

34. The “place” was Woodstock.

35. Perhaps this is a reference to “hippies”, who were sometimes known as the “lost generation”, partially because of their particularly acute alienation from their parents, and partially because of their presumed preoccupation with drugs. It could also be a reference to the ’60s TV show, “Lost in Space,” whose title was sometimes used as a synonym for someone who was rather high. Perhaps, their preference for psychedelia had pushed rock and roll so far from Holly’s music that it couldn’t be retrieved.

36. Probably a reference to Mick Jagger of the Rolling Stones; “Jumpin’ Jack Flash” was released in May, 1968.

37. The Stones’ Candlestick park concert? Candlestick park was also the venue for the Beatles’ final performance–the end of the rock ‘n’ roll era.

38. It’s possible that this is a reference to the Grateful Dead’s “Friend of the Devil”.

39. While playing a concert at the Altamont Speedway in 1968, the Stones appointed members of the Hell’s Angels to work security (on the advice of the Grateful Dead). In the darkness near the front of the stage, a young man named Meredith Hunter was beaten and stabbed to death — by the Angels. Public outcry that the song “Sympathy for the Devil” had somehow incited the violence caused the Stones to drop the song from their show for the next six years. This incident is chronicled in the documentary film “Gimme Shelter”. It’s also possible that McLean views the Stones as being negatively inspired (remember, he had an extensive religious background) by virtue of “Sympathy for the Devil”, “Their Satanic Majesties’ Request” and so on.

40. This could be a reference to Jimi Hendrix burning his Stratocaster at the Monterey Pop Festival, or simply the bonfires that were lit at the outside concerts. It could be a reference to Jagger dancing and prancing while the murder was happening. Mick Jagger is Satan, the murder provided the sacrifice.

41. Janis Joplin

42. Janis died of an accidental heroin overdose on October 4, 1970.

43. The “sacred store” might be Bill Graham’s Fillmore East, one of the great rock and roll venues of all time. Alternatively, this refers to record stores, and their longtime (then discontinued) practice of allowing customers to preview records in the store. It could also refer to record stores as “sacred” because this is where one goes to get “saved”. (See above lyric “Can music save your mortal soul?”) The music “wouldn’t play” means that nobody is interested in hearing Buddy Holly et.al.’s music anymore. Or, as above, the discontinuation of the in-store listening booths. Another interpretion is that the “store” is the record industry in 1970; the “music” is McLean’s own song, American Pie, and “the man” is the recording industry and radio. McLean’s style of music, particularly this song, just wouldn’t play. It was too long (over 8 minutes), too folksy, and too late.

44. Protestors being beaten by police and National Guard troops.

45. The trend towards psychedelic music in the ’60s.

46. It could be that the broken bells are the dead musicians: neither can produce any more music.

47. Holly, The Big Bopper, and Valens.

48. They died; rock died. Elvis has left the building. Buddy Holly is no more. Rock ‘n’ roll is over, at least in its original form. And Don McLean can only watch them go and sing, “Bye-bye, Miss American Pie…”