Return to Oz (song)
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"Return to Oz" is a song by the pop/electronica band Scissor Sisters. It is the last song on their 2004 debut album, Scissor Sisters, and uses the lyrical motif of the film Return to Oz as an allegory for crystal meth abuse. The song is about drug abuse within the gay community, especially crystal meth. In the words of the frontman for the band, Jake Shears, this song is about "friends I have had who became lost along the way".
[edit] Analysis
The first two verses of the song talk about specific groups of people and the crystal meth "scene". The repercussions of the drug are also talked about in the first verse.
"as his night came to an end he tried to grasp for his last friend
and pretend that he could wish himself health on a 4 leaf clover"
This reference to deteriorating health due to use of the drug returns throughout the song, with these references climaxing at the end of the song.
The chorus can be seen to have a double meaning, only one of which is drug related:
- The drugs are ruining everything that was once beautiful, due to addiction.
- A reference to the gay community in general. Within the community there are many subcultures as well as discriminations and biases.
The chorus furthermore refers to the film sharing the title of the song, in the reference to when Dorothy Gale returns to Oz only to find it in a post-apocalyptic state where the yellow brick road is desecrated - "gold is brown" - and the Emerald City is a collapsing ruin where the inhabitants have been turned to crystalline stone - "what once was Emerald City is now a Crystal Town" - and the only life she finds is Tik-tok, the "wind up man walking round and round". The line "gold is brown" is reference to those who start to use the drug thinking it is a fun party only to find out how it becomes a horrible addiction.
There are also references to how drug abuse not only affects personal health, but how it also affects the lives of those around the addict.
"3 oclock in the morning, you get a phone call from the queen with a hundred heads
She says that they're all dead...and now she just wanders the halls, thinking nothing, thinking nothing at all"
This line plays on the fact that people often associate these phone calls as bad news about someone passing away. The reference about thinking nothing at all can be seen as about knowing the problem was there and being helpless to stop it until finally it is too late, those you knew are gone and you are left numb. It also continues the reference to Return to Oz by mentioning the queen with a hundred heads, a character in the film who combined features of Mombi and Princess Langwidere from the original Oz books. At the end, the references become clearer and the intention of the song becomes easier to determine. A reference first to the wheelers from Return to Oz, and then to the skeksis from The Dark Crystal is made to play on the inhuman, decaying appearance of these characters, and remark on the physical appearance of the addict; "sunken faces and their wild rolling eyes" followed by a mention of clenching jaws.
"The patchwork girl has come to cinch the deal" — The reference of drugs, repercussions and death is made again. Crystal is a popular drug for PNP ('party n play') usually when one is partaking in party drugs and sex. In addition to increasing the need for sex and enabling the user to engage in marathon sex sessions, crystal lowers inhibitions and causes users to behave recklessly or to become forgetful. According to a recent San Diego study, crystal users often engage in unsafe sexual activities, and forget or choose not to use condoms. The study found that crystal users were six times less likely to use condoms [1]. Unsafe sex can greatly increase the risk of STD's not excluding HIV. The Patchwork Girl is therefore both a reference to the character from the Oz books, and a metaphor for the AIDS quilt which is made up of many "patches" signifying the number of lives lost to the disease.
- work in progress, collection of quotes and sources below, to be inserted properly when sufficient time*
http://www.cosmomovieawards.com/ig/20041018.htm <<<< review article mentioning the metaphor
http://dancemusic.about.com/od/artistshomepages/a/ScisSisIntBD_3.htm <<<< interview with Babydaddy, includes relevant quote - "You'd have to ask Jake about that, I think he wrote with Seattle in mind, with all the crystal meth tragedy over there. To me it's a song about San Francisco and to a lot of others it's about New York but it can be about anywhere. I wouldn't say that it was one specific incident, but I think everyone in the band and in our group of friends has been touched in some way by the problems it's talking about. Its it talking about the problems of the homogenization of the gay community and people losing themselves in self-deprecation, then losing themselves in an escape that's not a positive escape. It's a retracting from reality"
http://www.planetout.com/news/article.html?date=2007/01/18/6 <<<< news article mentioning the metaphor
http://www.lifeormeth.com/scissorsisters/4513765633 <<<< reference to this song on a meth awareness site (this site also contains other links that would be good to use as reference)
http://www.bbc.co.uk/manchester/music/2004/02/02/scissor_sisters.shtml <<<< bbc review of debut album, again mentions this song and its meaning
http://arts.guardian.co.uk/reviews/story/0,,1330622,00.html <<<< review from the guardian of live performance, including mention of song and meaning
http://www.arjanwrites.com/arjanwrites/2004/08/sizzling_sister.html <<<<< interview with Jake Shears, mentions this song and meaning
http://www.rainbownetwork.com/Music/detail.asp?iData=21953&iCat=112&iChannel=17&nChannel=Music <<<< album review
http://www.thebody.com/content/art30508.html <<<< source for existence of a meth problem in gay community
http://nymag.com/nymetro/urban/gay/features/5948/ <<<< source for existence of a meth problem in gay community
http://www.cbc.ca/fifth/darkcrystal/facts.html <<<< source for existence of a meth problem in gay community
http://www.villagevoice.com/people/0525,qmoore,65112,24.html <<<< source for existence of a meth problem in gay community
