Song Meanings by Band:

            Forums

     Requests

           Links

    Random Song

  Submit an
      Interpretation

Tool - Undertow Song Meanings

This song if you ask me is about an insane man that stands in the water being caught by the undertow and being drowned. He likes it because he hears voices and is comfortable with dying because he thinks the voice he hears is god speaking to him, but what god is really saying is to stay alive and enjoy life. This is why he says 'shut up,' because he realizes what this god is saying to him and doesn't want to hear it because he is insane.

That sounds good to me, but I'm only 14.

Submitted by: anonymous
Added: 2005-12-29 08:05:46     Rating:

I think it's about your demons, ie: alchol abuse (I know all about it)

Submitted by: anonymous
Added: 2006-01-21 01:01:03     Rating:

Let me just say that without you people not seeing anything that he stresses through his music, there would be nothing to talk about. The song undertow is one of my favorites because it expresses most of what he says in so many of his other songs, but instead much more direct. He speaks of this water, or this undertow which metaphorically is the world. The world how he once knew it. He continuously keeps falling into this old pattern because it is what he has always known, even though he does not choose that way, or should I say chosen that way. It is a constant cycle of realizing that he does not want to live like that so he climbs to a new place, but he can only stay away so long before he finds himself back where he is comfortable, back to what he had always known. "shut up shut up" reminding himself that he does not want to follow that way anymore. He is constantly using this analogy, the water, "i'm treading water" "the water will come and claim what is mine" "quicksand=water=the world" "almost like I'm swimming" "Seems like I've been here before.
Seems so familiar.
Seems like I'm slipping
into a dream within a dream." "It doesn't have to feel water"(-maynard's dick)
"So how could I let this bring me
back to my knees again again again"
" I'm weak and numb and insignificant,
and I'm back on my knees."--he feels like this because he keeps going back to the emptiness. Most of his songs are like a puzzle, you have to keep refering to another song to define a meaning. There are certain things that you have to do in order to hear what the lyrics mean. Yes, everyone has their own opinion, but do you really? Is your opinion made solely from within, or do you think that you think the way that you do, or your process of thinking, was influenced somewhat by your prior experiences? first track on salival, you must be vulnerable, not in a way where you will be taken advantage of literally, but vulnerable enough to set aside old views and doubts and be openminded. You have to have an open mind to see these messages, or you will think that a song is about jesus faking his death, or a crazy man LITERALLY standing halfway in lake of water. come on, I am sorry to be so... whatever I am being, but seriously. In a nutshell, YOU are what keeps my fire burning, or should I say, "you are fuel that sets my head on fire"

Submitted by: AllenTehAwesome
Added: 2006-02-20 23:34:25     Rating:

The song states it's meaning. It's about euphoria. It's a state of complete elation to everything around you. Your mind is completely cleared. Being a former practitioner of Ritual Magik (which we all know the members of Tool our devout in), I've achieved this state. It's something you have o experience to understand fully.

Submitted by: Earl
Added: 2006-05-31 13:18:25     Rating:

The song is (IMHO) about the effects of some psychodelic drug and coming down from a euphoric high. More specifically I'm confident the songs about Extacy. Maynards use of streams, undertows, swamps, bogs etc. like many of his lyrics mostly come from Carl Jungs influence.

Submitted by: anonymous
Added: 2006-06-28 00:05:43     Rating:

It kind of sounds like a depression song. If you havn't been depressed (for real) this would be hard to understand.

To me, it sounds like his emotions have overcome him but he's "too comfortable" to do anything about it. Or just too tired to recover. He says "you" often too so maybe someone is preventing him from finding what he wants. And then in the end the undertow keeps sucking him under so he can't get out.

Submitted by: anonymous
Added: 2006-11-28 16:59:57     Rating:

alright. This song is not about drugs, it's not about an induced euphoria, it is about society and the 'undertow' it pulls you along with from the day you are born. It refers to maynard, knowing this, and trying to stay 'above water' so to speak(hence the lyircs, 'under a second/third time now), but he keeps getting pulled under again because its all aorund him. The government tells you what to think and feel, media dictates what you want, parents and others already brainwashed and so giving you your opinions, some things have been so solidified that no one even questions society anymore, and that is what this song is expressing.
the end bit, euphoria, is about how incredibly easy it is for people to fall into the patterns and behaviors that society and the government want you to, to follow accepted religion and question very little, how euphoric it is to be at ignorance with truth. 'numb and insignificant' is an expression of being overwhelmed by this new truth he's discovered. essentially, it is saying that we will go no where without those who question what most are afraid to, and we will all 'die beneath the undertow' because we are all being swept along by the government and society and religious groups so much we are all but too far in to possibly escape it, and only those who dare will have to deal with the truth, to know, as the others float along in blissful ignorance.

Submitted by: xxSimpleEnigmaxx
Added: 2006-12-28 18:00:11     Rating:

I'm going to have to say I generally agree with "anonymous" but just for giggles let me add in my own two cents.

I was watching this interview with Maynard back from the Undertow days, and he was commenting on the band's music. He said that people need to realize the bad in our world is just as important as the good, yet many people have a hard time understanding that and instead just label them as a pessemistic band. "Don't just call me a pessemist, try and read between the lines." ~Maynard, Aenema

What I'm getting as it this just Maynard's justification for why he focuses on the bad in the world. He speaks of this voice "beneath the cold black water," that's sucking him under into some sort of anesthetic state of mind, where the bad in the world is no longer important. Fuck it. Let the world fall apart, as long as we're happy who gives a flying fuck? (Sarcasm intended)

Maynard, along with the rest of us, are "weak and numb and insignificant," unable to overcome this machine creating this anesthesia over society; the media, the government, and fundamentalists who want us to ignore the hatred in the world along with all of its sheer stupidity, and misguided anger. This machine pulls us back into the undertow, back under the water into a state of euphoria, where the only well-being that matters is our own.

"It seems there's no way out of this undertow."

Submitted by: anonymous
Added: 2007-07-18 04:41:18     Rating:

Personally I do think this song is about drugs and maybe specifically heroin. Maybe! I don't know. He says how could I let this bring be back to my knees. Could be the alcohol. Heroin is by far the hardest drug to get off of and the undertow is referring to how he just keeps falling into this inescapable euphoria. He continually repeats euphoria. Saying he is going to die in the undertow and there is no way out of the undertow. I think it is about relapse because that is exactly what an undertow is. The regretion of the water back into the sea after a wave. The wave is a wave of pleasure from the drug but he simply can't just get a wave of pleasure and have it be left at that like many people can do for stuff like weed instead the undertow of heroin is washing him away and out to sea. He will die there because there is no way he can fight against it.

Submitted by: anonymous
Added: 2008-02-05 20:00:05     Rating:

I think it's about an addiction, and when you're sober, you can see the effects it has, and you don't think you'll ever be able to escape, but once you take another hit, shot, or drink, you forget all about your problems and feel the euphoric effects it has.

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.