Reviews for The Pot Lyrics

i don't know why people don't try to understand every individual line and its importance to the song as a whole. i have never seen a song where tool ever wrote a line that had nothing to do with the rest of the song, and i've also never seen a song where tool blatantly comes out and starts talking about doing drugs without it being a metaphor... he is definitely talking about someone becoming manipulative in some way (probably guy below me got it), and he must be high to think that he can still talk down to other people after doing the things he's done, i.e. he's a hypocrite

"Who are you to wave your finger? / You must have been out 'your head" = He's calling the person a hypocrite, saying that he must have been mad to think that he was any better than anyone else.

"Eyehole deep in muddy waters / You practically raise the dead" = The hypocrite is up to his eyes in trouble, so to speak, with his act of greatness. Yet he continues to act high-and-mighty as if he's better than everyone else. "You practically raise the dead" is a metaphor for the hypocrite acting as if he's on par with God.

"Rob the grave to snow the cradle / Then burn the evidence down" = The hypocrite performs immoral acts and profits from them. "Snow the cradle" could be considered a metaphor for "showering one's home in riches." This shows that the hypocrite has gained his self-proclaimed "greatness" (i.e. wealth) through improper means. The hypocrite then proceeds to attempt to cover up his doings.

"Soapbox house of cards and glass" = The hypocrite preaches as if he knows better than they, yet the base on which his points rest is as sturdy as a house of cards. It's easily shattered, like glass.

"So don't go tossin' your stones around" = This is another common statement about hypocrites altered into Keenan's own words: "Those who live in glass houses should not throw stones."

"You must've been high" = The hypocrite must've been really high on himself to actually think he was better than anyone else.

"Foot in mouth and head up ass / So what’chu talkin' 'bout?" = Again calling the person a hypocrite, this time two times in succsession, and in different words each time. "God your foot in your mouth" and "God your head up your ass".

"Difficult to dance ‘round this one / ‘Til you pull it out, boy" = A bit hard to show someone how hypocritical he is unless he pulls his foot out of his mouth or his head from his ass, isn't it?

"Steal, borrow, reaper, savior / Shady inference" = The difference between right and wrong is presented here; opposite sides of the spectrum, if you will. Sealing is to reaper as borrow is to savior. The hypocrite has been stealing, as evidenced in the earlier lyric, "Rob the grave to snow the cradle".

"Kangaroo done hung the juror with the innocent" = This applies to the term "kangaroo court," in reference to shady and improper trial proceedings. Here, it's telling the hypocrite that his ways are like that of a kangaroo court: shady and improper (i.e. stealing).

"Now you're weepin' shades of chosen indigo / Got lemon juice up in your eye / When you pissed all over my black kettle" = The metaphor of the hypocrite urinating on the other's kettle is used to describe the hypocrite disregarding what the others say against him as unimportant garbage. Similar to peeling/squeezing a lemon and it squirting its stinging juice into his eye, his urine (i.e. his downtalking of what the others warned him of: the warnings they gave him of the consequences for becoming too prideful) has splashed back up off the kettle into his eye, stinging. He now realizes what he's been doing was wrong and breaks into tears, regretting his immoral deeds. This is metaphorically explained with the line, "Now you're weepin' chosen shades of indigo" in that he chose this path, yet is now crying in regret over it. He chose his own fate, his own tears, if you will.

"So full of it" = Referring to when he was being prideful and holier-than-thou: his statements proved he was full of shit with his almost Godlike claims of being so great.

"Fuckin' hypocrite" = Check and mate. This line fully proves my theory.

"Liar, lawyer" = This further ties into the earlier line referencing the term "kangaroo court".

"Mirror, show me what's the difference?" = Reference to Snow White and the queen's magic mirror. The queen would request the mirror to show her who the greatest one of all was. Here, the person is saying that all are equal: no one is better than any other.

"Weeping shades of indigo / Shed without a reason" = The people still don't know how he became so wealthy and prideful; they know not of his wrongdoings or what he's crying over. He is crying over those wrongdoings, yet they do not know that. They cannot figure out the reason for his tears.

"Mirror, for you what's the difference?" = A mirror has no sense of preference or bias; it simply shows what's put in front of it. It knows not what ego, stature, position, or power are; it shows anyone, no matter what part they play in society. This can be seen as the basic idea of all being equal. All are simply human.

"Kangaroo be stoned / He's guilty as the government" = The hypocrite has been sentenced to death by stoning by the government, which is hypocritical in and of itself.The government is just as guilty as the "kangaroo courts" themselves for allowing them to happen, for not having a way of stopping them from happening.

"Eyeballs deep in bloody waters" = His own blood has been shed from all the trouble he's built upon himself.

"Ganja police, you must've been out 'your mind" = Ganja is a slang term for cannabis, the plant form of marijuana. Similar to the government not having a surefire way of preventing kangaroo courts, police trying to uphold the anti-marijuana laws really can't do anything to stop the drug from getting around and being used, no matter how hard they'd like to try. This could be a metaphor (again disguised as a drug reference) for the hypocrite.in that no matter how much the people tried to tell him he was no better than anyone else and that acting that way was wrong, there was no getting through to him. Sometimes there is just no way to stop certain problems though some wish they could.

Man...tool is no doubt the greatest band of the century. Musically ther are far ahead of any contemporary band and genius, need not to mention. Their recent music carries a sudden and huge evolution matched by no other. I dont know how on earth they ended up giving birth to much intellectually stimulous music: you need not to be on drugs to get high!
Regardless of their lyrics their music stands out alone; because to me their music is unique and would serve as insipiration for many other artists to come__ and already has started showing up in other band's so called creative work!

By listening to the pot lots of times, i also think that it was written to shove it in peoples faces who say tool uses drugsto write their music, and you have to be on drugs to understand it. ''who are you to raise your finger'' ''eyeballs deep in mudded waters'' meaning they dont realy no the truth, they cant see it, why go saying stuff, you dont even know about. Any way, im not saying that what im saying is the truth, but it realy makes sense, even if you listen to the music of the song, it sounds mad, pissed off. I love tool, and am very amazed by their music, and how much effort they put into making their music, i realy like them because they are different, and do their own thing, and their music is just............ Amazing!!!

Tool has done a great job getting the point across. I smoke pot and I know that this song is not about that. It is Tool's way of expressing their opinions on government. ROLL A FATTY AND TURN UP THE TOOL!!!!!!

I like the POV that the submission from 12/22 takes, but, while it is about hypocrisy in our legal system it is also about marijuana. Kangaroo refers to trials that are corrupt, and often decided before they start, as is often the case with drug trials.
Cozened indigo refers to the corruption of the powerful. Cozened=deceitful Indigo= an ancient representation of wealth and power(THE GOVERNMENT!!!)

Well, with respect to Maynard, i would like to lend my interpretation. I have been listening to tool and this song for a long while, so here it goes...

Cozened means lying, deceitful, etc,
Indigo was a color used to symbolize wealth and power,
Kangaroo refers to trials that are seemingly staged and often frivolous, such as putting someone in prison for smoking pot(hence the name?), and letting rapists go free.
With that i think that this is tools way of saying that they oppose the corrupted system and they at some portions of the song "assume" the role of who they are referring to and become very sarcastic. And my last thing to say is that EVERYONE needs to listen to tool. My 58 year father listens to tool now, and he was a hippie, attendee at woodstock and is a blues harmonica player. Tool reaches across all genres.

I'm so glad there aren't a load of people saying how this songs about weed. I've heard that so many times. "The Pot" obviously refers to hypocrisy (hence "you pissed all over my black kettle) and the reference to "the pot calling the kettle black." I believe government and their innate hypocrisy are a sub-theme to the song, but not its main point.

Theres more to the song than the government, Kangaroo in this case was an event in which people were being jailed for marijuana without due process.

the songs sometimes are hard to get but i always seem to get them, well then again i always get songs pretty quick. this song is obviously about government. Vicarious is about people deriving pleasure from tragedy, like when your sitting in a traffic jam for an hour. then you get to the front and see body bags and ambulances, at about that point you realize that everyone just stopped to look. wings/10,000 days/jambi are all about his mother. 10,000 days became the album name because it had been exactly 10,000 days from when his mom first had a stroke to when she died.

i've not been disappointed by Tool from the first to the last album. this song is no different. but the thing about Tool is i have no idea what most of their songs are about. i can read the lyrics all day but that doesn't really indicate much. for instance, Eulogy, i've heard it a million times, read the lyrics a million times, still can't figure out who the song is about. sometimes it seems like its about Jesus, sometimes it seems like its about Hitler. is this song getting down on people who use pot or is it getting down on the government for making it illegal?

i love the song, but i have no idea what the lyrics mean. I figured out how to play the bass AND guitar lines on this song, and it is easy and confusing at the same time, if you get that.

i agree. i love this band because everything about their songs is magnificent! from the instrumental composition to the lyrical outrage. man, tool rocks

this is one of the most articulate bands of all times..... I identify with every song in one way or another, I hope they will forever tickle our imagination with their lyrical flirtations.... keep us guessing for the next adaptation of their intelect of life and music!!!

tool is prettty damn good.
their lyrics are unique and of there own.
They have a way of gettin a point across which i've never seen another band do.

this song is fucking awesome.
end of story.