Wiki
-
Length
3:59
This song is generally about the fact that actions have consequences and that we should learn from our mistakes rather than arrogantly or obliviously repeat them.
More specifically, the song is about the U.S.’s practice of meddling in foreign countries in pursuit of oil. It causes the listener to consider how certain U.S. policies and military actions related to the pursuit of that oil in the Middle East have helped provoke Middle Eastern animosity toward the U.S. “Black honey” refers to petroleum, and the bees from whom that honey must be removed symbolize the inhabitants of oil-producing Middle Eastern countries.
Dustin Kensrue told NPR, in an interview,
Lyrically, the song spawned from an image that popped into my head: someone continually swatting at a swarm of bees to get their honey, but somehow not understanding why they would sting back in return."
An additional quote that was in Thrice’s press release (link), but was removed from the NPR article is:
It seemed like a fitting metaphor for much of U.S. foreign policy.
Similarly, the Vagrant Records Thrice bio states,
Elsewhere the ominous “Black Honey” considers the detrimental effects of deja vu foreign policy. “We keep doing the same things and expecting to get something good out of it,” says Dustin exasperated. “We’ve built problem on problem on problem, and now we find ourselves with ISIS and people are like—maybe we’ll do more of the same! It hasn’t worked yet: so maybe we need more of holistic approach to what we’re doing.”
An older Thrice song, “The Sky Is Falling”, covered similar themes and was a regular on Thrice’s Summer 2016 To Be Everywhere Is To Be Nowhere tour setlist
Track descriptions on Last.fm are editable by everyone. Feel free to contribute!
All user-contributed text on this page is available under the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike License; additional terms may apply.
