The short story, "
Lather and Nothing Else" is about a man who is placed in the situation of having to be civil to his worst enemy. I was just listening to the song
Sentencing, by BoysNightOut, and I realized that this song can be related to the story, "
Lather and Nothing Else".
The picture to the right is a picture of the Canadian band from Burlington, Ontario; BoysNightOut.
Both of these stories are about
murder,
regret, and
consequences.
In both stories, the main characters have thoughts about
murder. In
Lather and Nothing Else, the main character contemplates killing Captain Torres whilst shaving him, as though he was one of his normal customers. Captian Torres was definitely not a normal customer, since he killed many innocent people. In
Sentencing, the narrator explains how he murdered someone, and how he is a murderer. Both stories are all about wanting to murder someone, and in
Sentencing, actually murdering them.
One of the other main themes of these stories are
regret. In
Sentencing, the song is all about how the main character regrets murdering someone. In my opinion, the writer of this song is trying to show the struggles of dealing with a murder, and how much the person regret it.
Lather and Nothing Else shows regret in the way that the barber thinks of all the things that could happen if he commited murder and realized how much he would regret it, so he never actually had a chance to experience the regret.
The other main theme I noticed that these two stories had in common is realization of
consequences. In
Lather And Nothing Else, the story is about how the man is contemplating murder, but never follows through because he realizes the possible consequences.
Sentencing shows this by repeating "nothing makes sense anymore, when murder's just a mistake that you have made." This shows that the consequences that were given to the main character make your life harder, rather than easier.
In my opinion, both of these songs are interchangeable, theme-wise.
Here are the lyrics to the song,
Sentencing, By BoysNightOut.
SentencingBy:
BoysNightOutThe smell of her perfume struggles to cover everything inside this ringing room.
Though once subdued, the silence seems to sing:
Whoa-oh, I told you so,
Whoa-oh, I told you so.
My name is evidence, my role is undeniable; unless I've become inadmissible -
In crimes of consequence, I'm only as reliable as the defendant's defense is defendable.
I am the kill; though I'm unwilling to be still and accept this evil as my own personal - and sentient - will.
Nothing makes sense anymore, when murder's just a mistake that you have made.
Nothing makes sense anymore, so a sick and guilty man will be born again with conscience saved.
Judicial precedent will see to that, I'll see to that, he'll see to that,
It's impossible given the incident, given his catatonic state
To imagine it playing out any other way?
He was admitted on that day, the doctor read his case,
There were implausibilities he couldn't place;
And it was obvious that there was something more to this patient. something had been missed.
"It's this hole I can see in each of his eyes... where all of the events that happen in this real world kind of just fall through
"It's loneliness, it's loneliness
Nothing makes sense anymore, when murder's just a mistake that you have made.
Nothing makes sense anymore, so sick and guilty men will be born again with consciences."
References:
Punk News.
http://www.punknews.org/images/bands/boysnightout2007.jpg.
"BoysNightOut lyrics." PLyrics.
www.plyrics.com/lyrics/boysnightout/sentencing.html.
I was looking through pictures on a website, and I came across the one on the right. It is a picture from the movie, "Sweeney Todd", and it reminds me of Lather and Nothing Else.
