Song Meanings by Band:

            Forums

     Requests

           Links

    Random Song

  Submit an
      Interpretation

Tool - The Pot Song Meanings

1 2 3 Next >

Well, my interpretation of this song might be completely wrong, but when listening to the album through and through for the first time, this song stuck out most. Yes I was one of the many that heard the first few lines and immediately rewinded it, thinking it was a guest voice. This is the first thing that stuck out in my mind about the song. I didn't think it was Maynard upon first hearing it, which meant that at one point or another, whether intentional or the work of a higher intelligence, Maynard (and friends) tapped into a differing spirit, or a spirit that was not his own. Notice also how easily this song can be covering by tori amos. I think tori amos inspired the tones of maynard's voice which encaptulates venus (the female) which in another body, would be his mother. Imitating a female artist would be the best way for a male artist to conjure a female spirit, so using his tori influence would accentuate the components of femininity, transcendence and familiarity in the song.

"so you're saying that Maynard is embodying another person? Or that he's really someone else?"

in the song, yes. Where as the rest of the album is Maynard as himself broadly viewing his world, or a singular part of his world (his mother for instance), in this song he is definitely embodying that part of the world (his mother) and looking back at himself. Maynard is playing the part of his mother speaking (or yelling perhaps) back at him - from the grave or from heaven, wherever you would place her.

"who are you to wave your finger?
Ya' must have been out your head.
Eye hole deep in muddy waters.
You practically raised the dead."

this scheme is intriguing, suggesting that the muddy waters would very well be the hypothetical grave of his mother, and Maynard hypothetically digging it up in order to raise her spirit for this song (muddy waters alludes to the fact that most Tool songs happen in the rain, if you catch my drift - which is why the dirt of the grave is mud and there is water)

"rob the grave, to snow the cradle.
Then burn the evidence down.
Soapbox, house of cards, and glass,
so don't go tossin' your stones around."

this is more broad a concept, suggesting that Maynard wishes to burn the evidence of his unwillingness to submit to the will of God (her death) and leave it be. Instead he would rather point the finger at those unbelievers that surround her. (think back to "10,000 Days (Wings for Marie part 2) Maynard says "the ignorant sinners in the congregation gather round spewing sympathy, spare me"...This is the setting of his mother's funeral where the non-believers surround him, he sees them as less than his mother).

"you must have been high,
you must have been high
you must have been"

when I hear this line, it immediately makes me think of when my mother would see me do something stupid and say something like, "you must be high," or "you must have been high"...(saying in the fashion of "ya musta been high" gives me the impression that he's mimmicking an african american women, "jive" talk one would say, and being that the songs have wholly afro-centric rhythms and cadences gives me further illumination on this concept. I get this illumination only because I am african american, so my aesthetic perspective is highly tuned to that slight of a nuance.)

"foot in mouth and head up asshole
what you talkin' bout?
Difficult to dance round this one
til you pull it out...Boy"

this I see as an emphatic play on words. Maynard has in the past been suspected of being homosexual, so the homo-erotic connotation "head up asshole" brings up a hypothetical situation where a person is perverting a concept. His mother sees his embodiment of her "intension" (those crazy Tool guys and their circles!) as a perversion. His mother feels violated, as if she were being raped, but in quite a condescending manner, she calls him a "boy" who choses to distort the view to his own childish needs instead of being a "man" who would take the hit and move on - (or more harshly calls him "boy" as to suggest his penis (or point of view) is too small to truly ravage (embody) her. Homosexuality, bi-sexuality and transgender behavior on the side of the male usually stems from a deprevation of motherly or womanly affection, attention and love (usually accentuated by sexual abuse from a male father-figure, or simply lack of direction and attention). The confusion of gender roles greatly adds to the bending of one's perception. If, in fact, Maynard grappled with homosexuality or bi-sexuality, the relevance of this theme would stem from the abuse he mentions in songs like "jimmy" (a great throwback to this song), "Prison Sex" and so forth. This coupled with the fact that his mother was paralyzed and thus helpless to aid him in such a situation would bring about these themes in his thinking process. This also is a throwback to the obvious transgender (or andyrogynous) aesthetic Maynard creates on stage, where he wears woman's clothing and synthetic parts to emulate the opposite sex.

[refrain]
steal, borrow, reaper, savior, shady inference
kangaroo done hung the juror with the innocence.
Now
[you weep in / you're weeping] shades of chosen indigo
got lemon juice up in your eye
when you pissed all over my black kettle
you must have been high!

in the previous song, Maynard defended the faith of his mother, saying that she deserves her place in heaven. In this line, his mother is answering that by saying "you shouldn't steal my faith in order to justify your own disposition. You don't know what my god wants or what I deserve." the allusion to lemon juice is something I cared not to deconstruct because it seems to hold just another aesthetic nuance that I tap easily into. Lemon juice has a pretty blinding effect when applied to the human eye. Pissing on her black kettle, or her urn where her ashes are (the imagery I got) is another extension of the perversion this song invokes. Weeping in shades of chosen indigo has nothing but rhetorical value to me because of the obvious throwbacks to lachrymology, a constant theme in the world of Tool. Obviously, instead of moving on with life he "chooses" to weep and to be childish. (keep in mind that this very song is a process of weeping, or mourning, for Maynard, so there is yet another hypothetical maternal critique innately placed upon the song).

The rest of the song seems to move in a constant and has mostly rhetorical value (as "rhetoric" is commonly considered the language of femininity...Females "talk too much"). It calls on Maynard as being a hypocrite for citing that what he believes is true ("my mother suffered, she believed, she belongs in heaven, and I will join her") and what others believe is false (ignorant sinners). Maynard is supposed to be this open-minded, truth speaking artist, but in fact, he sees himself as just imposing his views on others, views that he doesn't know to be undisputably correct (hypothetically) and thus calls himself a hypocrite using the invoked intention of his mother.

who are you to wave your finger?
So full of it
eyeballs deep in muddy waters
fuckin' hypocrite

liar, lawyer - mirror, show me what's the difference?
Kangaroo done hung the guilty with the innocent.

Now...
[you weep in / you're weeping] shades of chosen indigo
got lemon juice up in your eye, eye *
when you pissed all over my black kettle
you must've been...

So who are you to wave your finger?
Who are you to wave your [mighty / many / fatty] fingers at me?
You must have been out your mind

[weeping / weep in] shades of indigo
shed without a reason
[weeping / weep in] shades of indigo

liar, lawyer - mirror, for you what's the difference?
Kangaroo
[bestowed: "he's guilty as the government"
/ be stoned, he's guilty ask the government ]

now...
[you weep in / you're weeping] shades of chosen indigo
got lemon juice up in your eye
now when you pissed all over my black kettle
you must've been high!

Eyeballs deep in bloody waters
eyeballs deep in muddy waters
[ganja police / ganja? P-lease! / got to believe / ??]
you must have been out your mind

the song also takes a political tone and on a whole, without "10,000 days (wings for marie part 2)" to preceed it, would seem to be a general song about mother earth criticizing humanity "the son" and accusing humanity of hypocrisy (government, politics) and perversion (religion and pollution). The moral of the story is that this song is not only a deeply personal confession of how Maynard felt (my mother shouldn't have died, she deserved more and the world sucks) which would be wholly selfish and ungodly (making it a confession) but is also a lesson toward the collective conscious that is humanity. Let go of the past, let your nature (mother) die (a symbol of the de-naturing of humanity through evolutionary cadence and selection) and embrace your future. , becoming part of the cycle of nature and existence.

Any comments, you can e mail me at sekuro1014@yahoo.Com be cause I doubt I will remember to come back to this site. Peace!

Submitted by: skinmelts
Added: 2006-09-18 14:50:07     Rating:

I think this song is more political. Obviously over the pot controversies. “lemon juice in your eye.” if you had glaucoma you would know that is about as easy to see with that as when you have lemon juice in your eye. No one this far has been able to explain the word kangaroo in the song. People think it is random. But you got to remember who wrote the song and realize that can’t be true. Kangaroos are a nuisance in australia. Kind of like our politics at this point in time. “hung the juror with the innocent.” yeah the people who need it pay the same price as people who want it. Anyways that’s my idea. Give it some thought and I would love feed back.

Submitted by: anonymous
Added: 2006-09-20 11:19:35     Rating:

Kangaroo court
from wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

a kangaroo court is a 'judicial' proceeding that denies proper procedure in the name of expediency; a fraudulent or unjust trial where the decision has essentially been made in advance, usually for the purpose of providing a conviction, either going through the motions of manipulated procedure or allowing no defence at all.

Submitted by: anonymous
Added: 2006-09-20 22:32:21     Rating:

Please stop attaching so much to it. It's essentially about "the pot calling the kettle black". 10,000 Days isn't hard to figure out. They've had their time with the psychadelic ambiguous lyrics. On this album, there is a very clear message.

Submitted by: anonymous
Added: 2006-10-14 20:25:01     Rating:

Alright we all know how ambiguous Tool's lyrics can be so I will just divulge my two cents knowing I can very well much be concluding fallacies. But anyway, I think the song has strong allusions to our current government and our political "leaders" or as somebody from louisiana would view them: our "heroes" hahaha sorry long story... The song is about Bush and about the Bush administration's policies, I think Maynard is basically criticizing how Bush and his miscreants are handling the prolonged and plaguing issues in our country, be they terrorism, the economy or whatever. At the same time MJK is making fun of Bush when he says "difficult to dance around this one before you pull it out...Boy" he's suggesting that our "fearless leader" is just a scared helpless boy who doesn't know what the hell he's doing. Now when he says that its difficult to dance around him, I see that as a sexual reference... Why ? Think about, we all know our goverment officials are just self-indulgent liars who really don't care about the country save for the people who can help them get re-elected to satisfy their own personal wants. So in a way, through out the annals of history we clearly see that it doesn't matter who's at the "helm", they will always one way or another f*ck us in the ass (those who have listened to maynards lyrics for a long time from every album would know what I'm talking about with the anal-sex metaphors and what they imply in a figurative sense, especially those who are aware that "Prison Sex" isn't about the mere experience of sodomizing somebody in a jail cell). Sodomy here becomes a metaphor that illustrates how the goverment is always f*cking over its own people, regardless where your were born or what country are you from. So by dancing to our "fearless leader" he is just stating the fact that we all know the goverment is gonna f*ck, we are subject to that, but in this particuliar case, the one doing the f*cking is just a scared shit-less boy which makes the experience even more shameful and pathetic. By reading my interpretation listen to song the over again, and you will find that most of his metaphors are a vague but at the same time clear and dare I say humoristic reference to our goverment and our "liberator of nations" how they are controlling and "pissing all over our black kettle" which is a metaphor that may represent the people who are deeply affected by decisions of our goverments, who are those? The honest hard working people.

Submitted by: anonymous
Added: 2006-10-23 16:28:30     Rating:

"kangaroo" refers to "kangaroo courts", which were mock courts established to prove people guilty without a fair trial or any real evidence - most of the court cases dealt with marijuana users

Submitted by: Toolio
Added: 2006-11-03 12:14:43     Rating:

"the pot calling the kettle black" - a situation in which one person criticizes another for a fault they have themselves.

A.K.A. - hypocrisy

Submitted by: nickdavies7
Added: 2006-11-12 07:48:58     Rating:

This is my fav Tool song off 10k days.
I've heard this tune over 70 or 80 times and as a vocalist/lyricist, I focus on that aspect of songs, not only Tool. What I first picked up when I heard it was how people can be hypocritical (the pot caling the kettle black) when they are high due to pot, hence the title. So it's quite a clever play on words by Maynard and this is evident throughout the song. Such as "piss all over my black kettle" elaborating on pot calling kettle black and "eyeballs deep in muddy waters" meaning that for your hypocritical actions you r basically eye level deep in your crap (close enuf to muddy waters).
If you follow links through wikipedia to this song it will show an exert of an interview with adam jones and he states that this song is about hypocricy.

Peace

Submitted by: anonymous
Added: 2006-11-21 22:45:32     Rating:

"Kangaroo" refers to "kangaroo courts", which were mock courts established to prove people guilty without a fair trial or any real evidence - most of the court cases dealt with marijuana users

Submitted by: Zaq
Added: 2006-11-23 00:30:54     Rating:

Heres the word straight from the prophets mouth, boys and girls.


THE POT

who are you to wave your finger? you musta been outta your head.
eye hole deep in muddy waters. You practically raised the dead.
rob the grave to snow the cradle then burn the evidence down.
soap box house of cards and glass so don't go tossin' your stones around.

you musta been high

foot in mouth and head up ass, so watcha talking bout?
difficult to dance round this one till you pull it out. boy

you musta been so high.

steal, borrow, refer, save your shady inference.
kangaroo done hung the jury with the innocent.

now you're weeping shades of cozened indigo. (musta) got lemon juice
up in your eye when you pissed all over my black kettle.

you musta been high.

who are you to wave your finger? so full of it.
eye balls deep in muddy waters. fuckin hypocrite.
liar, lawyer, mirror show me. what's the difference?
kangaroo done hung the guilty with the innocent.

now you're weeping shades of cozened indigo. (musta) got lemon juice
up in your eye when you pissed all over my black kettle.

you musta been high.

So who are you to wave your finger?
who are you to wave your fatty fingers at me?
you must have been outta your mind.
Weepin shades of indigo.

liar, lawyer, mirror for ya. what's the difference?
kangaroo be stoned. He's guilty as the government.

now you're weeping shades of cozened indigo. (musta) got lemon juice
up in your eye when you pissed all over my black kettle.

you musta been high.

eye balls deep in muddy waters.
you're balls deep in muddy waters.
Ganja, please, you must have been outta your mind.

WORDS BY MAYNARD JAMES KEENAN

Submitted by: jaadster
Added: 2006-11-25 09:41:30     Rating:

ok not to be a downer but I spend my time listening to to Tool and listening to the instrumentals and letting them tell me the stories and then the music truely inspires me to be better at drumming. Do you guys ever actually jam to the music and not just endulge in the lyrics. Im not saying you only listen to Tool for the lyrics but there is the great guitar bass and drumming.

Submitted by: anonymous
Added: 2006-11-30 22:43:37     Rating:

One should not fear a challenge.(2006-09-20 22:32:21) Seldom does Maynard allow one to easily interpret anything that he has written. He is all about deep thought and creativity. The world is filled with so many that are capable of thinking on a higher level, but sadly, never push themselves to do so. Maynard wants to make you think. He wants to raise the consciousness of the Tool listener. He's trying to do you a favor... Help him out..

Submitted by: anonymous
Added: 2006-12-14 05:27:51     Rating:

This "interpretation" is mostly in response to Submitted by: anonymous Added: 2006-08-14 03:41:01".

In general, I see this song as "pushing the cliche", because that's how humans are - very cliche-esque.

Though, in regards to the aformentioned commentary by "anonymous":

To me, the lines:

"foot in mouth and head up asshole
what you talkin' bout?
Difficult to dance round this one
til you pull it out...Boy"

...Has to do with ignorance - until you have to face it....

In reference to other comments in the following paragraph:

For one, I know for a 100% fact that homosexuality, bisexuality, or transgender does *not* come front the deprevation of womanly/motherly love or attention or sexual abuse.
"boy" might well refer to a person ignorant or ill-educated in the ways of the world or just an "ignoramous" who has his "head up his ass" and isn't paying attention to what's going on around him.

Perhaps Maynard's dressing in woman's clothing on stage are an attempt at challenging the paradigm? Or maybe he's attempting to be like the "stereotypical" homosexual (ie, dressing in woman's clothing) since he has said that "homosexuals are the next stage in evolution". Or maybe just because he wants to?
As Sigmund Freud said, "Sometimes a cigar is just a cigar".

Submitted by: anonymous
Added: 2006-12-21 16:07:47     Rating:

here's my two cents on a tiny part.
one thing I am absolutely sure of about the lyrics of The Pot is that the lyrics "weeping shades of cozened indigo, must have got lemon juice up in your eye..." is referring to Anja--the 6th chakra--the third eye. The color that is most commonly associated to this chakra is indigo. this chakra deals mainly with enlightenment of the self. The word 'cozen' means to cheat, deceive, or trick. I'm not sure how to directly interpret that all together, but I would say that it is at least indicating hypocrisy, false enlightenment, or trying to follow through with intent to mislead others on a path of enlightenment.
i wouldn't doubt the band, and the album artist alex grey are educated on the chakra system, along with plenty of other systems of enlightenment.

Submitted by: anonymous
Added: 2007-01-08 08:46:58     Rating:

Come on guys, the song is an inter-reflective view of Tool themselves. You've seen them live. No matter what "The Pot" is, the "black kettle" is Tool. You know- how can the pot call the kettle black? They both are black! (one is no more corrupt than the other). And beside that, they are both culinary "Tools". Think about it.

Submitted by: anonymous
Added: 2007-02-15 03:16:01     Rating:

The last lines bear some explanation...I just skimmed through the interpretations (I'm spent after poring over the 46&2 thread, heh), but from what I've seen no one has mentioned the most plausible interpretation of the last two lines. To me, the whole song hinges on them: "Ganja, puh-lease!/You must have been outta your mind!" My interpretation of that closing is that Maynard is rejecting the notion that the person he's speaking of in the song was on pot...he "must've been so high" on something else if (s)he was as "out of his mind" as Maynard says (s)he was. You think "ganja" would inspire this person's actions, Maynard asks? Please!

This didn't hit me until I listened to the song about 20 times AND saw the lyrics posted at toolshed. Before I made that connection, the song seemed lacking of their usual cleverness...sure, the possible double entendre of pot as a synonym for weed and as in the pot/kettle metaphor, but that alone didn't seem satisfactory. Only once I realized that "The Pot" wasn't actually a title with a double meaning, but that its assumed meaning was a red herring...that's when the lyrics became brilliant in my mind. Reminded me of APC's "The Outsider", where everyone assumed the title was referring to the "suicidal imbecile" referred to in the song, but Maynard later said it was actually in reference to the person who COULD NOT PROPERLY DEAL with the person struggling with suicidal ideation.

The man is a brilliant, brilliant lyricist.

Peace,
Matt, Cutthemullet1@aol.com

Submitted by: Zaq
Added: 2007-02-19 10:03:54     Rating:

"Ganja PLEASE! You must have been out your mind!!!"
I think this could be Maynard saying directly to all of us "Its not about pot. and if you think it is, you're crazy."

That is all for now...
~Zaq~

Submitted by: LovinToolLongTime
Added: 2007-04-09 03:12:03     Rating:

Just like in my interpretation for Sober.....
I have the 275th issue of "Guitar School", Adam is on the cover, Adam says it's about the saying, "the pot calling the kettle black." Like someone said above, it's about hypocrisy.
If you got a chance to read the article in Revolver magazine right before 10000 Days was released, Maynard says that all the other Tool albums were about finding oneself and third eye, and you know, everything else Tool writes about, (which is quite a bit!) Well he said that it seems the message wasn't gotten, so 10,000 Days, as a whole, has a pretty straight-forward message ....... "you can lead a horse to water, but you can't make it drink." He then states something close to ... "it's all right there, your on your own. We tried." It's a good interview, and a rare thing for them to do one in such a mainstream magazine.

Submitted by: anonymous
Added: 2007-06-29 14:33:08     Rating:

OK....first, free your mind of all the other ideas shared here on this page.

While they are all opinions and exist without my approval, THEY ARE ALL TERRIBLY WRONG!!

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Chief_Black_Kettle

I'd suggest the schools you people attended (or maybe didn't attend) should be ashamed. This song is so clearly NOT about reefer. Trust me I'm an 18 yr veteran of the bud.

Clearly this song is about a series of historical events that happened right under your nose apparently. Lets just say the Cheyenne Indians know what I'm talking about. Robbery, lies, murdered women and children.

Oh for christsakes, read it for yourself if you care! I'd sign off with peace but that means nothing to this generation of Americans...shame on you!

kelbale@hotmail.com

Submitted by: YesRly
Added: 2007-08-14 09:45:36     Rating:

I'm bout to pull a Zaq on everyone.

"Kangaroo done hung the jury with the innocent"

How can you judge if you haven't heard the case?

1 2 3 Next >

Submit your interpretation!

Discuss this group in the Tool forum

Email me when this band is updated

Back to Tool Song Meanings

Home

Users Online
There are 15 guests and 0 registered users online.