Thursday, February 28, 2008

Also, "I Write The Songs" Is By Bruce Johnston

Philosophical question: Can someone live his life based on the song "My Way"?

8 Comments:

Blogger Irene Done said...

One of my very favorite music-listening moments of the last decade was hearing Paul Anka sing Bon Jovi's "It's My Life" just for that lyric about Frank and My Way.

8:28 PM, February 27, 2008  
Anonymous Anonymous said...

No. This is the myth of Ayn Rand's crazy philosophy. Atlas Shrugged purports to show a society formed of utter individualists.

But that is as impossible as ten Thoreaus who decide to randomly walk through the woods, based on nothing but their own whims, with no reference to other people ... and yet who end up walking in a pack.

Doesn't happen. The good life -- nay, any livable life -- must be lived somewhere near the mean between conformity and individualism. If my friend prefers Denny's to Red Robin, and I prefer Red Robin to Denny's, and yet we end up at a restaurant together, that isn't because we sold out our principles. It's because we prefer to eat with company.

Whereas Ayn Rand and Frank Sinatra will dine alone.

2:12 AM, February 28, 2008  
Blogger New England Guy said...

Although a legitimate interpretation, I don't think Frank (or Sid Vicious in my preferred rendering) was expounding on the virtues of selfishness or suggesting that everyone live that way. I think its purely a measure of self-regard- he's saying I know better than all the other suckers (at least about my own life)so I'm going to do it my way. Maybe if your Frank Sinatra, that makes sense and if you're Sid Vicious, it doesn't.

6:57 AM, February 28, 2008  
Anonymous Anonymous said...

I think everyone is missing the paradox here. If you live your life based on a song someone elwse wrote, it's already too late to live your life "my way."

8:04 AM, February 28, 2008  
Blogger New England Guy said...

Aha- but if you choose to sing someone else's song or base your life or eat in your friend's favorite restaurant of your volition, you are doing it "your way." My way doesn't have to mean self-sufficiency, isolation or having no regard for others (though it can), I think it means not taking orders (unless you choose to).

12:43 PM, February 28, 2008  
Anonymous Anonymous said...

by LAGuy's definition isn't everyone doing it 'their' way?

9:57 PM, February 28, 2008  
Anonymous Anonymous said...

Did Sid Vicious have different words? I recall him singing something about killing a cat

12:18 PM, February 29, 2008  
Anonymous Anonymous said...

Yes

http://www.lyricallysquared.com/viewsong/Sid-Vicious/My-Way/140371

12:21 PM, February 29, 2008  

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