Lowe began his recording career in 1966 as a member of psychedelic rock group Kippington Lodge, founded with his friend Brinsley Schwarz. That band released a few singles on Parlophone. Three years later, Kippington Lodge had changed its name to Brinsley Schwarz and its musical focus to country and blues rock.
After leaving Brinsley Schwarz in the mid-1970s, Lowe began playing in Rockpile with Dave Edmunds. In August 1976 Lowe released "So It Goes" b/w "Heart of the City", the first single on the Stiff Records label where he was in-house producer (the label's first EP was Lowe's 1977 four-track release Bowi, apparently named in response to David Bowie's contemporary LP Low) . On this and other labels, Lowe would go on to produce The Damned's Damned Damned Damned and many albums by Elvis Costello. Upon moving from Stiff to Jake Riviera's Radar and F-Beat labels, Lowe became extremely selective in his choice of production tasks.
Because the two main writers in Rockpile had contracts with different record labels and managers, albums were always credited to either Lowe or Edmunds, so there is only one official Rockpile album, from the very end of the collaboration - 1980's Seconds of Pleasure, featuring the Lowe songs "When I Write the Book" and "Teacher Teacher" - but all of Lowe's and Edmunds' solo albums from the period were effectively Rockpile albums. Rockpile's demise was hastened by a number of conflicts, not between the group, but their management.
Lowe's best-known song from this era is probably "I Knew the Bride When She Used to Rock 'n' Roll" (a reworking of Chuck Berry's "You Never Can Tell", a.k.a. "Teenage Wedding"). On the 1977 Live Stiffs compilation with a pickup band called Last Chicken in the Shop, he virtually sneers out his contempt for all concerned; in 1985, fronting Nick Lowe and His Cowboy Outfit on the album The Rose of England, he hasn't changed the words, but the tone is entirely different, even affectionate. The latter recording featured Huey Lewis & the News as his backing band.
In 1979, Lowe married country singer Carlene Carter, daughter of country singers Carl Smith and June Carter Cash and step-daughter of Johnny Cash. He adopted her daughter, Tiffany Anastasia Lowe. The marriage with Lowe lasted until the mid-1980s, but they remained friends, and Lowe remained close to the Carter/Cash family; he and Johnny Cash played and recorded together, and Cash recorded several of his songs.
After the demise of Rockpile, Lowe toured for a period with his band Noise to Go and later with The Cowboy Outfit, which also included the noted keyboard player Paul Carrack. Lowe was also a member of the short-lived mainly studio project Little Village with John Hiatt, Ry Cooder, and Jim Keltner.
In 1992, "(What's So Funny 'bout) Peace, Love, and Understanding" was covered by Curtis Stigers on the soundtrack album to The Bodyguard, an album that sold over fifteen million copies. Because Lowe received royalties from these sales, he suddenly found himself a millionaire. Freed from commercial constraints, Lowe has recorded more solo albums in his own very individual style to critical acclaim.
Lowe played Glastonbury 2011, performing a short solo set of Brinsley Schwarz tracks on The Spirit Of 71 stage, where they played back in 1971, before heading to the Acoustic Stage for a full band show.
Lowe performed as an opening act for Wilco in their North American tour, September 2011. He performed solo with acoustic guitar.
His more recent albums include
At My Age (2007)
The Old Magic (2011)
The Beast In Me
Nick Lowe Lyrics
Jump to: Overall Meaning ↴ Line by Line Meaning ↴
Is caged by frail and fragile bonds
Restless by day
And by night, rants and rages at the stars
God help, the beast in me
The beast in me
Has had to learn to live with pain
And in the twinkling of an eye
Might have to be restrained
God help the beast in me
Sometimes
It tries to kid me that it's just a teddy bear
Or even somehow managed
To vanish in the air
And that is when I must beware
Of the beast in me
That everybody knows
They've seen him out dressed in my clothes
Patently unclear
If it's New York or New Year
God help the beast in me
The beast in me
"Beast in Me" is a song that portrays the inner turmoil and darkness that an individual endures. The first two lines imply that the singer has the potential of becoming violent due to the beast-like rage that is caged within them. The third line, "Restless by day," indicates that the aggression is always present, and the singer cannot escape it even during the daytime. The fourth line, "By night, rants and rages at the stars," implies that night reveals the actual monster within them, as they express their irritation towards the sky.
The chorus, "God help the beast in me," repeatedly suggests the singer’s fear of the anger that they contain, and that they need assistance to keep it under control. Lines "Has had to learn to live with pain, And how to shelter from the rain," suggests that the singer has been hurt in the past and subsequently has to deal with emotional pain and finds solace in solitude. He is afraid that the beast would rush without warning, prompting him to maintain emotional and psychological balance.
The third strophe signifies the singer's struggle to distinguish between the limitations of his mind and realities of his life. The lines "Sometimes it tries to kid me that it's just a teddy bear, Or even somehow managed to vanish into the air," portrays that the singer is barely aware of the transition of the beast within him from a delusion to reality. The final lines, "That everybody knows, They've seen him out dressed in my clothes, Patently unclear, If it's New York or New Year" indicates that the beast, at times, takes over, leaving the singer unrecognizable, and his actions are directly attributed to the beast, who dresses and acts like him.
Line by Line Meaning
The beast in me
The uncontrollable and wild part of my personality
Is caged by frail and fragile bonds
It is restrained by weak and delicate restraints or limitations
Restless by day
It is agitated and worried during the day
And by night, rants and rages at the stars
It becomes more restless and angry at night, often directed towards the universe or fate
God help, the beast in me
I need divine intervention to control my unpredictable nature
Has had to learn to live with pain
I have learned to endure suffering due to my internal struggle
And how to shelter from the rain
I have developed ways to cope with difficult situations
And in the twinkling of an eye
Suddenly, without warning
Might have to be restrained
It may need to be controlled or suppressed
God help the beast in me
I again seek divine assistance to contain my wild nature
Sometimes
On occasion
It tries to kid me that it's just a teddy bear
My wild nature attempts to deceive me that it is harmless
Or even somehow managed
It tries to convince me that it has overcome its wild inclinations
To vanish in the air
That it has disappeared entirely
And that is when I must beware
I must be cautious during these moments
Of the beast in me
Of my uncontrolled and untamed personality
That everybody knows
That people are aware of
They've seen him out dressed in my clothes
They have witnessed my wild side taking over my actions
Patently unclear
It is not evident
If it's New York or New Year
Whether it is a specific place or a particular time period
God help the beast in me
Once again praying for divine intervention to tame my wild side
Lyrics © O/B/O APRA AMCOS
Written by: NICK LOWE
Lyrics Licensed & Provided by LyricFind
@amirnahian
The beast in me
Is caged by frail and fragile bars
Restless by day and by night
Rants and rages at the stars
God help the beast in me
The beast in me
Has had to learn to live with pain
And how to shelter from the rain
And in the twinkling of an eye
Might have to be restrained
God help the beast in me
Sometimes it tries to kid me
That it's just a teddy bear
Or even somehow manage
To vanish in the air
Then that is when I must beware
Of the beast in me
That everybody knows
They've seen him out dressed in my clothes
Patently unclear
If it's New York or New Year
God help the beast in me
The beast in me
@stevieray56
Nick Lowe just this past summer released an excellent cover version of the Bee Gees-penned “Heartbreaker,” which was a hit in 1982 for Dionne Warwick. Lowe has been on the other side of that equation in his career. Elvis Costello famously turned his “(What’s So Funny) ‘Bout Peace, Love And Understanding” into a signature anthem. And Lowe also penned a song for his one-time father-in-law Johnny Cash that eventually was recorded by The Man In Black on his acclaimed comeback album with Rick Rubin, 1994’s American Recordings. As it turned out, Lowe’s own version of the song gained its own wide audience thanks to its inclusion in the pilot episode of a television series that turned out to do all right. But more on that in a moment.
Lowe’s original intent was to write a song that would prop Cash up at a career ebb. “It was during that period from the mid-70s up until he started working with Rick Rubin, which was probably the lowest part of his career,” Lowe said. “He was doing this show at Wembley, which was a big family affair … he wasn’t a well man and he was working his arse off to keep this thing afloat. And I had this idea for a song and Carlene Carter told him about it, and he said, ‘I’ll come ‘round and hear it on the way to Wembley,’ and he turned up with his whole entourage at our house. And I played him the song, which was incredibly embarrassing because it wasn’t really ready yet. And he said to me, it’s not right but it’s a really good idea … and every time I’d see him after that he’d always ask me, ‘How’s ‘The Beast In Me’ coming on?’ And every time he asked, I’d kind of mentally take it out of the box and look at it again.”
“And finally, after he did a show at the Royal Albert Hall and asked me about it again, I went home and finished it! And then I sent it to him, and I didn’t hear anything, and then my stepdaughter went to stay at his house in Jamaica and she told me, Grampa’s singing your song to everybody … and the next thing I knew, it came out on the American Recordings. I was really thrilled, because it is a good song and he was a brilliant bloke. I really loved him.”
“The Beast In Me” was a perfect fit for Cash, whose impossibly deep voice had the ability to project the song’s complex mixture of menace and vulnerability. What makes the song so clever is how the narrator complains about this alter ego as if it is an entity of malice and destruction completely separate from him. And, as the first verse makes clear, it is hardly containable: “The beast in me is caged by frail and fragile bars/ Restless by day, and by night/ Rants and rages at the stars.”
The second verse brings some subtle motivation into the picture, with Lowe hinting at some past pain that has caused this Mr. Hyde to emerge from Dr. Jekyll. “And in the twinkling of an eye/ Might have to be restrained,” he mentions about this monster, suggesting that it can go from charming to unhinged without any warning. In the bridge, the tug of war continues, as the narrator explains just how persuasive and deceptive his other self can be. “That is when I must beware,” he sings, the melody line deepening as if to warn the listener of the other shoe about to drop.
In the final verse, Lowe implies that the beast is more popular than the restrained part of himself. And his need to rage is unfettered by occasion or location: “They’ve seen him out late in my clothes/ Patently unclear/ If it’s New York of New Year.” The refrain is a cry for mercy: “God help the beast in me.”
Cash got the jump by a few months on Lowe in terms of recording the song, as the songwriter’s own take came out a few months later in 1994 on the album The Impossible Bird. But it was Lowe’s version of “The Beast In Me” which David Chase chose to close out the opening episode of The Sopranos. Those lyrics gave anti-hero Tony Soprano a theme that would characterize him for the remainder of that groundbreaking show, a prime example of a song belatedly finding the ideal setting to showcase its brilliance.
@hughjass5775
Beautiful, my favorite version. So simple, so painfully sweet.
@jonahwood4873
So simple, so painfully sweet. Perfectly describes Tony Soprano and the series as a whole
@randyb.hughes4609
Sopranos Soundtrack Album...what a Great Compilation!
@amirnahian
The beast in me
Is caged by frail and fragile bars
Restless by day and by night
Rants and rages at the stars
God help the beast in me
The beast in me
Has had to learn to live with pain
And how to shelter from the rain
And in the twinkling of an eye
Might have to be restrained
God help the beast in me
Sometimes it tries to kid me
That it's just a teddy bear
Or even somehow manage
To vanish in the air
Then that is when I must beware
Of the beast in me
That everybody knows
They've seen him out dressed in my clothes
Patently unclear
If it's New York or New Year
God help the beast in me
The beast in me
@paulgerkin2851
One of the best songs I've ever heard !
@americanb4columbus638
This is incredibly clean and precise. Beautiful.
@tonmisty
Was thinking the same.
@aakritiroshan523
I'm here after Hozier recommended this song for "making friends with your sleep paralysis monster" 😂
@jodyhoffman1405
We all have a beast inside of us that we try to keep hidden.
@rvhill69
I don't try to hide my beast. I just struggle to control it. It my personal war!