Cruel Lyrics
Bodies, can't you see what everybody wants from you?
[Verse 1]
Forgive the kids
For they don't know how to live
Run the alleys, casually
[Chorus]
Cruel, cruel
[Refrain]
Bodies, can't you see what everybody wants from you?
If you could want that, too
[Verse 2]
They could take or leave you
So they took you and they left you
How could they be casually
[Chorus]
Cruel, cruel, oh-hoh
Cruel, cruel, oh-hoh
[Refrain]
Bodies, can't you see what everybody wants from you?
If you could want that, too
Then you'll be happy
You were the one waving flares in the air
So they could see you
And they were the zephyr blowing past you
Blowing fastly so they can't see you
[Chorus]
Cruel, cruel, oh-hoh
Cruel, cruel, oh-hoh
Cruel, cruel, oh-hoh
Cruel, cruel, oh-hoh
About
Cruel to be kind.
That’s how Annie Clark described the core theme of Strange Mercy. In the single “Cruel”, the former is explored as she details the subtle cruelties society inflicts on its women.
Q&A
Find answers to frequently asked questions about the song and explore its deeper meaning
In 2018, NPR ranked this as the #38 greatest song by a female or nonbinary artist in the 21st century, saying:
On her third record as St. Vincent, Annie Clark went for the jugular. Paring down her ostentatious art-rock affectations and sharpening her narrative focus allowed for an album of shimmering sweetness undercut by propulsive freak-outs: pop music, as Clark described it, by way of a ‘housewife on pills.’ ‘Cruel’ does it all perfectly, cramming cinematic crescendos, an unforgettable earworm riff, mountains of textured guitars and near the entirety of Clark’s vocal range into a brisk three and a half minutes. It’s joyous but twisted, danceable but creepy: Clark at her most accessible and most delightfully bizarre.
Well, it should be noted that it’s not that it’s my family. It’s that I’m kidnapped by a bereaved, motherless family, and they enlist me to do all these traditionally motherly tasks that I fail at—or at least, don’t reach the level of their approval. And then they bury me.
– via AV Club (September, 2011)
- 2.Cruel
- 3.Cheerleader
- 4.Surgeon
- 9.Dilettante
- 12.This Wave