anonymous 2007-04-25 10:53:50    

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The title definitely spawned from an ad or something that Lennon red. But I think it has some kinda ideas about heroin and sexual activity entwined together... "I need a fix cause I'm going down..." - I'm depressed insert heroin here, that should be pretty clear to all? "when I hold you in my arms and I feel my finger on your trigger..." that's got to be about a girl I mean you can't hold a needle in your arms or a gun really, if it was either of those things he would have said hand instead of arms I think.

anonymous 2007-05-01 19:31:36    

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I believe it is about suicide..Maybe John was planning it?

anonymous 2007-06-17 02:32:32    

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Indeed this particular song possessed riffs, melodies, and lyrical content created by Lennon at different times throughout the recording process of the white album. Lets at least assume the obscure cluster of material all derived from this particular time period...(but who the hell really knows?) Being a musician myself, I can speak with confidence for all musicians when I state this fact...Some songs are created to formulate a specific, straight forward meaning, message, or story in the listeners mind.

The spectrum of emotional stimulation to the brain (or mood it creates) is intentionally put forth by the artist to convey something that even the most casual of listeners can groove to and understand. Simply put, ANYONE can relate to what it's about in the exact same way as the next person. This type of song, although boring or mundane to some, will often reach the greatest audience. Half of our music today incorporates songs such as these, and many of them are beautiful compositions evolving from the creative genius of simplicity. "HAPPINESS IS A WARM GUN" IS NOT ONE OF THESE SONGS!!!! (What I described earlier could easily pertain to any of the earliest Beatles hits...) Several years after this "pop-like" phase, progressing musical talent, along with deeper more abstract lyrical writing evolved in the group. Lets get to the point! Any even semi-notorious musical group endures hours upon hours of studio time, constantly bringing all of their new ideas to te table, recording non-stop. We as the audience hear only a fraction of a bands recordings through their albums. There are countless songs out there like 'happiness" in regards to the fact that they exist as several different ideas/melodies construed at different times.

Each individual part of the song is created at some point in time and recorded, but had NOTHING to do with the times, situations and basis for the other sections of the song that were recorded. Originaly they were all un-related to each other...perhaps bits and peices of entire songs that were already written, but not meant to be...I could never say what, but something in lennons mind compelled him to extract fragments of his ingenious verses and melodies,possibly even disregarding the other eighty percent of several song ideas in order to create the one that meant the most to him. And "happiness" is what resulted from hours of creative experimentation.

OK...here are some themes and innuendos I have thought about and analyzed...(please remember these are only my opinions and interpretations. I really don't know crap about anything, but its fun to theorize!) First of all, something Ive already seen on this page numerous times is the drug references. IT IS THERE! if you disagree with me, I respect that, but PLEASE don't fool yourself into thinking that just because you admire the Beatles music, who they were, what they stood for etc...that they didn't use drugs heavily. Drugs of all kinds in fact! There should be no awkwardness or shame to this subject whatsoever. but nor shall we dwell on it. back to the lyrics...(when I hold you in my arms) refers to the relationship between the syringe and the arm. (And I feel my finger on your trigger)is the act of pushing the plunger down. (I know nobody can do me no harm) obviously the mindset of heroin euphoria (because...happiness is a warm gun) a "gun" could be symbolic or even slang for a syringe. The descriptive reference to it being a "warm" gun could be the fact that depending on the method of "cooking" the heroin, the liquid may feel warm or make the syringe warm when it is drawn up out of the hot spoon. What makes even more sense to me though is that all forms of OPIATE drugs, (codeine, morphine,) with HEROIN being the most potent, always give a sensation of false warmth all over the body. This is one of its desirable effects. BUT I HAVE ONE MORE THEORY about this particular part...could it be the peace-advocating Lennon simply mocking or in a sarcastic way speaking out the part of a guns/war supporter, and how obsessed THEY were with fighting, just as HE was obsessed with peace? If you listen closely to the tone of the singers voice during this part, it definitely possess a "cocky" kinda "in your face" type attitude. Well I'm only gonna write about the part of the song that I'm sure of...so see ya! I admit, there's no doubt to the colorful abstraction at the beginning of the song, and the verses that follow after are equally as ponderous and perplexing. I could not begin to start on those ones! I have to many theroes that are just as bizzarre as the lyrics!

BUT IN THE END, IT REMAINS TRUE THAT ALL MUSIC IS TO BE INTERPRETED BY THE INDIVIDUAL LISTENER!!

anonymous 2007-07-18 23:20:48    

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It's not about suicide. It's more likely to be able drugs than anything, while it does have some sexual references.

Whoever thinks it's about suicide then you know nothing of the Beatles because you cannot interpret a song as about suicide just because it says "happiness is a warm gun". Their songs have underlying meanings, it's not obvious on the surface.

anonymous 2007-07-25 22:27:52    

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Its got to be about Heroin.

I need a fix because I'm going down

When I hold you in my arms & feel my finger in your trigger= Shooting up with a needle.

I think John was into it in those days as he brought out Cold Turkey as a solo artist not long after this.

anonymous 2007-08-14 15:32:25    

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Nobody touched on the beginning. "...The man in the back with the multicolored mirrors on his hobnail boots/Is lying with his eyes while his hands are busy working over time/A soap impression of his wife which he ate and donated to the national trust" This is about the Maharishi in India and John's disenchantment upon seeing him flirting, touching and doing other naughty business with a female follower. Mirrors on boots are to look up women's skirts. Lying eyes about what John felt were hypocritical actions based on his teaching. His hands fondling a woman other than his wife. The soap impression line is a little unclear and might have just been John having some fun with words.

The rest of the song is a clear drug reference. Lennon was addicted to heroin. Needing a hit is blatent heroin use lingo. Holding the heroin in his arms because junkies shoot into arm veins, thus "hold it", not like a hug, even though it creates a bit of clever metaphor that the Beatles, especially John, are so well-known for doing. Heroin is an opiate, the same stuff that is used in morphine to take away pain, thus "Nobody can do me no harm". Just because Lennon did some drugs doesn't mean he should be despised. And just because he wrote some songs doesn't make him a saint. It's rock n roll, and he helped invent it. It's got to be low down and dangerous at times. LET IT BE!

anonymous 2007-11-05 11:34:08    

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This song is about a women who discovers her husband is cheating on her, so she kills him. She is the woman who doesn't miss much. The velvet gloves are to hide fingerprints. She is the lizard, observant but not observed. The man whose hands are working overtime is obviously infidelity, while his eyes are lying(to the wife).The man with glass on his hobnail boots was a real man who used mirrors to see up girls skirts in London. That man is her husband. He eats her soap impression, meaning he thinks she is unintelligent, and donates it to the national trust(slang for the toilet).

Needing a fix in the next paragraph refers, after the murder of her husband, to her ever gnawing need for revenge. The uptown bits and Mother superior are one in the same, the womans husbands mistress, who got away.

When the song says 'mama' after happiness is a warm gun, the speaker is speaking to her mother, and to the gun. Because throughout the relationship the woman found solace and power in her mother, whereas her husband could not hurt her, and so the gun becomes her mother because her mother dissaproves. Such is that the song was written from the betrayed woman to her mother.

anonymous 2007-11-15 18:01:20    

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This song is about heroin addiction, and was cleverly mixed in with sexual innuendo involving masturbation and John Lennon's passion for Yoko. Very cleverly written indeed, perhaps the Violent Femmes' "Blister in the Sun" was inspired by this piece!

anonymous 2007-11-29 11:56:27    

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Quite simple - it's about guns: Maybe a syringe, maybe a dick, whatever. And how it makes you feel alright.

anonymous 2008-01-13 18:21:30    

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When did everyone start making the Beatles out to be heroin addicts. Are drugs and sex as deep as people can go when interpreting songs? And John would never commit suicide. So that's dumb. a man after nothing but world peace...but clearly this song must be about a schizo, or murder. WRONG. George Martin (their recording manager) showed John the cover of an American gun magazine which had the heading "happiness is a warm gun." John thought this was outrageous and said "a warm gun means that you've just shot something" The song was however welded together from 3 different pieces of johns music. The song was banned from BBC because they said there were sexual symbolism and they thought the "H" in happiness stood for "H" for heroin, to which John replied "It wasn't about "H" at all"

anonymous 2008-02-27 16:54:12    

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Anyone arguing their opinion here notice a reoccurring theme in most of the interpretations? Heroin, Sex, Guns(Power) etc. are all seductive and addictive. Our "fixes", our "escapes" in effect, our vices.

Happiness is a Warm gun
=
The gratification of fulfilling a desire/want/need/craving/addiction

anonymous 2008-03-02 06:00:05    

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It doesn't really have a meaning but the genius in it is that the lyrics have people thinking many things it is truly written by a musical genius as I have written many as well mhm

anonymous 2008-04-25 10:46:45    

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This song is about the men going to war in vietnom, and bassically-leaving their wives and not getting ANY sex.

happiness is a warm gun-haPENIS is a warm gun
bang bang (sleary banging a girl) shoot shoot (cuming)
in the military soldiers would often refer to their penis as their gun.


the first verse I'm not too sure about, but I think itz about the military wives having to loose their husbands


The man in the crowd with the multicoloured mirrors
On his hobnail boots = just 1 of the man soldiers in his military uniform.

Lying with his eyes while his hands are busy
Working overtime = a soldier is finally getting a chance to relax and masturbate.

A soap impression of his wife which he ate
And donated to the National Trust = kinda blah. possibly eating his wife out...and bassically giving her away when he goes to war....but not too sure on this one.


I need a fix 'cause I'm going down
Down to the bits that I left uptown
I need a fix cause I'm going down = obviouse man needs to get laid, cheer him up, just feel GOOD. down to the bits that I left uptown, vietnon soldiers that he [saw] killed.

Mother Superior jumped the gun
Mother Superior jumped the gun
Mother Superior jumped the gun
Mother Superior jumped the gun
this war wasn't needed, happened to soon.

happiness is a warm gun(happiness is a warm penis)
warm meaning pleasured in any way possible

happiness is a warm gun momma (just an exspresion like woh momma that feels good!)


When I hold you in my arms
And I feel my finger on your trigger = missing wife for reasons of love....and sex such as fingering her.


I know nobody can do me no harm = back at home where a soldier is safe from the war, with his wife, ect. (just being safe from the war)

happiness is a warm yes it is...
Gun!! cleary, cuming


so there ya go, missing wifes and getting laid by them, some soldiers would cheat on their wifes, if they could find a woman around there anyway. and of course masturbation.

this is not of heroin...though I suppose it could be, and knwoing the beatle they probably ment gun as a heroin boost for the soldiers as well.

i cracked this before across the universe, but if you watch the happiness is a warm gun song, it completly focuses on the injured soldiers finally coming home, a bunch of sexy nurses, and their just happy to see a woman.



there ya go
im pretty confident with this one
~gabEE

munkieboy 2008-04-26 07:52:13    

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I don't try to pretend what John was meaning, if anything.

But to me the beginning is about seeing the girl he loves being in love with an undeserving prick...

the second part seems like just some cool lines like people have said

the last part is the realization that in order for someone to feel on top of the world, someone else must feel an equal amount of pain and sadness (karma, yin and yang, etc.)

anonymous 2008-08-03 11:08:20    

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My mother told me that a "Warm Gun" refers to an erection!!
NO JOKE!

anonymous 2008-08-28 22:59:53    

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It's about shooting heroin.