Song Details
- Album Release Date: 2012
- Genre: industrial
Song Meaning of “The Girl in Black” by Black Light Burns
This song is about a young woman, drowning in self-destructive behavior and spiraling into a darker and darker mental state. The constant sense of desolation and the feeling of being stuck in the same depressed circle of thoughts and emotions is musically illustrated by the atmospheric guitar and drums that increase in intensity as the song progresses.
The lyrics tell of a girl, shrouded in a dark veil of depression, loneliness and addiction, her broken and despairing life slowly burning away as she struggles to keep herself from slipping away entirely. She is desperately trying to cling on but ultimately, she’s trapped in her ongoing distress with nothing to give her hope; she’s ‘on the floor with nothing more’. The ‘girl in black’ of the title is a reflection of the pain and anguish she’s struggling to keep at bay, and the idea of her as a tragic figure is reinforced by the motif of her being ‘lost in the night’.
The lyrics raise some questions – why is she in this place and why can’t she get out of it? The song provides no answers, but gives us an insight into a world of suffering and isolation that is all too frequently shrouded in darkness and silence. The song confronts us with the brutal reality of struggling with depression and addiction, and serves to remind us that, if we are ever to be able to help someone who is in that situation, we must never forget that they are still a person underneath the sorrow and pain.