What does Johnny Ringo mean?

Crown the Empire: Johnny Ringo Meaning

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Album cover for Johnny Ringo album cover

Johnny Ringo Lyrics


This is your time,
Your life's flashing before your eyes.
And soon enough you will realize that this is goodbye,
but what if I gave you a chance?
You just have to sell your soul.

Look around, what do you see?
The choices you never had...

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  1. anonymous
    click a star to vote
     Feb 29th 2016 !⃝

    "This is your time,
    Your life's flashing before your eyes.
    And soon enough you will realize that this is goodbye,
    but what if I gave you a chance?
    You just have to sell your soul."

    I think this means that things are starting to go south for someone in life. Bad things are happening and they meet someone (the narrator) and the narrator makes them think that if they have faith in them, they can make their life better, but this narrator is only doing this for some sort of selfish purpose.

    "Look around, what do you see?
    The choices you never had the guts to make?
    I'm sorry you never could be the man that you wanted,
    but regret is wasted on me."

    The person is realising that they could've made their life better on their own but they were scared to go through it on their own. They're now regretting being with the narrator, and they realise they put too much faith in the narrator. They shouldn't have trusted them. They regret it.

    "I can feel air inside my lungs again.
    All because of you.
    I can rebuild my life and start again.
    All because of you."

    The narrator is the one who feels alive again, not making the person feel alive like what the person thought was supposed to happen.

    "This feeling's amazing, I know.
    But be careful, you know not what you wish for.
    Granted life but now you've cheated death.
    There's no where to run when you run from yourself."

    The person doesn't see a way to get away from the narrator so he asks the narrator if he can teach him to be like him, but the narrator is warning him that if he doesn't like it, he'll be trapped like that and that if he doesn't like who he becomes there won't be a way to get away from himself.

    "But fear not for as long as you live you are mine,
    and even in death you will find.
    You've lived with regret for so long but now,
    is your chance to change what has been wrong."

    The narrator knows that he has the person so much "under his spell" or whatever that he isn't going to leave, even if he can, even though he regrets it.

    "And I know that my destiny wasn't written in the stars,
    It was just a part of satellites and it's all because of you.
    Yeah, it's all because of you."

    The person is speaking to the narrator now. He's practically saying "I know now that you knew my life was going to be turned upside down. You waited for it to happen so you could write my destiny for me."

    "Don't ever trust the devil, bitch!"

    The narrator is referring to himself as the devil, and he's mocking the person. He's practically saying "You never should have trusted me because now I have control."

    "I never wanted this.
    (It's time that you suffered the consequence.)
    I should have know my time was up.
    (I crave you your time, and now your soul is mine.)"

    It's a conversation. The person says "I never wanted this. This isn't how I thought it would turn out."
    The narrator says "You should've thought of that before. Too late now, you should be punished for your foolish thinking."
    The person says "I should've known this was more about helping yourself than it was me."
    The narrator says "Yup, but it's too late now. You're mine."

    "I can't feel air inside my lungs.
    I'm dead.
    All because of...
    YOU!"

    This is the person speaking to the narrator. He's saying "The person who was supposed to help me out is hurting my life."

    ***

    So basically this song is about someone who saw someone who was going through a hard time and pretended to be their friend and help them out until they learned secrets about them and used those secrets against them to blackmail them into getting what they wanted in the end. It's a song of manipulation and regret in putting too much trust in someone.


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