Agnes by Glass Animals
This is my own opinion and intepretation, do not take my word as fact!
This song is always an emotional experience for me, having lost people to drug abuse and having had many run ins with suicidal thoughts and ideation both from others and from myself, with me doing my best to drown those thoughts in the past. This song tells its own story so well through its music and background that it adds so much, everything is perfectly in tune with itself to where it adds so much more emotion to the song.
From the start of the song there is a water drop, a shimmer of water, and a phone ringing. The drums take the shape of an uneven heartbeat, a pounding in the head. A breathing apparatus can be heard, this was a close one. The synths start in, trailing down and away and then holding a tone, letting you know that the high is still felt in the aftermath. The piano starts in with a rhythm that reminds of a fading high, a consistent three notes, then a lower, then a higher, I feel this as a somber tone, a high sobering, and then the higher note at the end almost brings a little hope, like the perspective of the singer is that Agnes isnt lost yet, and then lyrics “Agnes, just stop and think a minute”
The singer is talking about Agnes in the first verse, they are still missing. Stop and think for a minute, it was different back then and now it's something different. The little trembles in the singer's voice throughout this verse always hits me. The phone ringing in the background still, as the song slowly begins to build. The song swells with the chorus signifying that Agnes is high again. “I want to hold you like you’re mine” is a line that even in the best of time always hits me like a truck, because, same, for so many people, past and present. A foreshadowed line is hummed and muffled as the chorus continue, building until it breaks and calms back down with the second verse
The singer continues talking about Agnes, wondering where my friend went, being lost to so much depression and doing their best to mask those feelings with drugs and altered states. “Where went that cheeky friend of mine, where went that billion dollar smile” is another one that hits hard, because, with so many others, and also knowing myself, those two things are the things that I miss the most from others and myself when I am going through it. The singer mentions that Agnes overdid the liquor and this time they pulled the trigger, you were low all the time so you kept getting high. The song starts to build back up on “Guess life is long, when soaked in sadness” , and something that people who have gone through bad depression really understand, the concept of ‘borrowed time’ because it feels like your time is just moments away, at all times.
The song after “I want to hold you like you’re mine” , both times this lyric is sung, the voice is layered to sound like two others are saying it as well, everyone is here for you and wants to see you better is the message here. And then the muffled lyrics from before are given voice “You’re gone but you’re on my mind, I’m lost but I don’t know why” , wondering why someone had such an impact on you is so easy to miss, until they are gone and this lyric hits that message. A second swell hits, building, and building, and then you realize, the swell isn’t going to come back down, sirens can be heard in the background, phone no longer ringing or if it is, it's lost in the sound of the high. The sirens arrive when the lyrics end and the swell just keeps going. Then the synths take on a new form, almost as if they are taking Agnes away, passing on.
The song settles to drums, the breathing throughout the song, and a single synth holding a steady tone. The synth switches to a repeating hit that repeats and repeats, everything else gets quieter as it goes on, distant conversation can be heard but can’t be understood, and we are finally left with the one synth looping indefinitely. On the vinyl version of this album, the last second of this song is on a closed groove, which means it loops forever until you yourself stop the song. I believe that is the intended way the entire album and this song especially is supposed to end, with you stopping it. Never be afraid to reach out and touch someone's life, you never know what cycle you might be ending or life you could be saving.