2007-01-02 23:19:30 · 16 answers · asked by claireh3635 1 in Entertainment & Music ➔ Music
there is no meaning. phil wrote the song to help deal with the pain he felt from the divorce of his wife. it is just a song nothing to it. phil has sound countless amounts of time there is nothing to it. do a search for in the air tonigth lyrics and you will see that what i said is true
2007-01-02 23:23:17 · answer #1 · answered by Anonymous · 1⤊ 0⤋
Collins wrote this about the anger he felt after divorcing his first wife Andrea in 1979. He was so devastated that he left Genesis for a short time.
Collins explains the lyrics, "If you told me you were drowning, I would not lend a hand," by saying the drowning is symbolic.
The meaning of this song became a pervasive Urban Myth.
1. The story, which is not true, is that Collins watched as a man who raped his wife drowned. Another version has Collins writing this about about a man who watched another drown, and singing it to him at a concert.
2.Yet another variation claims that when Collins was a young boy, he witnessed a man drowning someone but was too far away to help. Later, he hired a private detective to find the man, sent him a free ticket to his concert, and premiered the song that night with the spotlight on the man the whole time.
These are both untrue.
2007-01-02 23:29:29 · answer #2 · answered by Fay 5 · 2⤊ 1⤋
Good question. I will probably be thinking about this all day.
Here are the Lyrics. I will have to think on it more.
I can feel it coming in the air tonight, Oh Lord
I've been waiting for this moment, all my life, Oh Lord
Can you feel it coming in the air tonight, Oh Lord, Oh Lord
Well, if you told me you were drowning
I would not lend a hand
I've seen your face before my friend
But I don't know if you know who I am
Well, I was there and I saw what you did
I saw it with my own two eyes
So you can wipe off the grin, I know where you've been
It's all been a pack of lies
And I can feel it coming in the air tonight, Oh Lord
I've been waiting for this moment for all my life, Oh Lord
I can feel it in the air tonight, Oh Lord, Oh Lord
And I've been waiting for this moment all my life, Oh Lord, Oh Lord
Well I remember, I remember don't worry
How could I ever forget, it's the first time, the last time we ever met
But I know the reason why you keep your silence up, no you don't fool me
The hurt doesn't show; but the pain still grows
It's no stranger to you or me
And I can feel it coming in the air tonight, Oh Lord...
2007-01-02 23:26:50 · answer #3 · answered by kerry9477 4 · 0⤊ 1⤋
I'm not a Beatles fan, and I don't find nothing offensive about that song or them lines at all. He was only making a statement about himself, or maybe even someone else, that hit their woman be it a girlfriend or wife, which sorry to say did happen more often back then than it does to day, I should say it happened back then as much as it does to day, but was excepted as in, people did not talk about it that much. And all Lennon did was bring it to the forefront, to let people know what is going on in the world, and no one is doing anything about it. But he or the person in their song is doing something about it, as he's stopped beating the woman and things are getting better. I don't see nothing wrong with that at all. I think maybe you are going overboard a bit with the song. So I guess you don't like Hendrix shooting his old lady and running off to Mexico. I bet she was beaten many times, before she was shot. Or the Rolling Stones, singing about how Stupid Girl, a put down on all women, and that they were useless. But that is not the case. One always has to remember in the 50s it was very well known that men beat their woman, girlfriend/wife, and it also was true into the 60s, when people like The Beatles brought it to the forefront. So as a song goes, it's a great song, for it's open to what was going on at the time, and that it's also time to change things and make it better. If I was bothered by that song for that verse alone, then I would be bothered by over have the songs in my collection. I'm okay with that. Cause all it is doing is telling me things like that got to stop, and we have to start to make things better. In which case he is doing. take care dave
2016-05-22 22:27:37 · answer #4 · answered by Anonymous · 0⤊ 0⤋
(a true reckoning was). . . coming "in the air tonight". For Phil Collins, this meant coming to terms with his painful-past and his new-reality. . .
2007-01-02 23:31:09 · answer #5 · answered by Anonymous · 0⤊ 0⤋
Miss Tickle is right it's about his friend who drowned -it was a song we studied as part of a popular music lecture at university
2007-01-03 01:52:02 · answer #6 · answered by Benjamin J 3 · 0⤊ 1⤋
The song is all about a robbery in his house why he was tied up and his wife rapped in front of him
but I agree with Marty. PC is a wanker
2007-01-02 23:23:30 · answer #7 · answered by Anonymous · 1⤊ 1⤋
He's been waiting for this moment for all of his life, oh Lord...oh Lord. I think he's eagerly anticipating relations with a particular lady for the first time. I could be wrong.
2007-01-02 23:27:07 · answer #8 · answered by Anonymous · 0⤊ 1⤋
How strange for a woman to get "rapped". Does this mean they tie her up and sing Ragga to her?
2007-01-02 23:44:11 · answer #9 · answered by Joe 3 · 0⤊ 0⤋
The Genesis drummer just farted and this was his way of letting everyone know!
2007-01-02 23:40:53 · answer #10 · answered by Anonymous · 1⤊ 0⤋