The song was released in the middle of Trump’s presidency (2018) during a time that was especially controversial and polarized. The nation was divided- either very happy or dissatisfied with the presidency. Matt Healy touches on so many issues and creates a doomsday feeling through the content and form of the song. Healy illustrates chaos and the message is overwhelming- which I interpret were his intentions. He calls attention to the irrepressible conflict and tragedies that held the attention of the public during 2018. An accumulation of it all accurately depicts the enormous stress of not only entire nations, but for any individual who consumes any media.
Love It If We Made It can be summed up with one the most recurring lines from the song, “modernity has failed us”. But the song is not meant to blame Trump for such an accusation, but is to acknowledge how news is received. In recent years the public uses various platforms to get their information. Platforms like Twitter, Instagram, and Facebook are so susceptible to misinformation, yet people take this news wholeheartedly with little skepticism for its qualifications and accuracy. “Access all the applications/ that are hardening positions based on miscommunication,” sings Healy. He references Trump throughout the song because not only because the president at the time very active in the media, but his followers began to develop the message of “fuck your feelings”. America became extremely politically divided. The public did not want to hear anything unless it validated their own beliefs. It is this ignorance and division that creates angry, uneducated, and mean people.
https://www.amazon.com/Trump-2020-Flag-Fuck-Feelings/dp/B084TNJDB9
Matt Healy has alway been open about his complicated relationship with religion. He identifies as an Atheist, but has spoken in the past about craving the support and enthusiasm of having faith and believing in a God. Healy proclaims “Jesus save us!” in the song before repeating “modernity had failed us,” once again. This is meant to provide a better understanding of just how desperate the feeling of wanting to be ok in the end is. As an artist, the only thing he can really do is speak to an audience on these issues. Otherwise, it’s really out of anyone’s control, so he turns to a religious figure to “save us” out of hopelessness.
The song references a bunch of specific instances of political, social and overall troubling events, which is compiled to further push the emotions Healy is trying to invoke. He references the drowning of a 3-year old refugee, Trump acknowledging Kayne on Twitter, and the death of Lil Peep. All very separate issues but hold the attention of the public the same.
October 2, 2022 at 8:35 am
Grace,
You’ve got such a great some here and I really like how you make the nuanced point that the song is not so much about Trump, but misinformation caused by media exposure and applications, as well (it seems to be) the instant gratification that modernity has provided. I’m glad you linked to that Genius site, as I see that the 1975 have added their own notations to the lyrics. I’ve never seen that before and you’re going to need to be very careful not to rely on them for your own work. In other words, we don’t want you just regurgitating what they wrote there. As we know from Schneider and Rosenthal and Flacks, what the songwriters intended is much less important than how users make meaning of the song once the song is in the public space.
In future posts, please don’t just drop links in the middle of the post; actually link properly by, as you have with the lyrics, linking meaningful words in the sentence.
And please be sure to address each of the components of the prompt. Here we are missing a discussion of genre and the addition of links to “examples of the kinds of events that were happening” in the world when the song was written and released. Doing this will help you even more on your way to your podcast.
Bill