'Odds Of Even'

[Moderno]

Hi, everybody. I visit this website and forum since a few years ago.

I'm spanish and I need your help with something about this song. I know that the title is a wordplay but it's difficult to me, I don't understand the real meaning of the last sentence of the song. I think it's related with the previous line with the angels and the demons, two opossite concepts, like the odd numbers and the even numbers, also with the other meaning of odds (posibilities).

Can you explain me the full meaning of the sentence "No one is exempt from the odds of even" with other words to be able to understand the song? I hope you can help me!

[Nemoris Inferioris]

I consider the song about Death, and nobody can escape death. Or, the title can be looked at as "What are the Odds of us getting even?", maybe vengence, paying your dues, whatever. Just my theory.

[Enname]

It doesn't make sense because it is not really a phrase in and of itself in English. Usually if you are talking about 'odds' there is a verb in there to describe the type of chance or game being played 'odds of it falling even', 'odds of becoming a...', etc. Phrase searching yields 'odds are even' or 'odds get even.' Here it is like a partial reference to a more complex series of interlocking metaphors. Kind of a choose your own interpretation - even if for Manson it probably does have a specific meaning.

Personally I like the ambiguity because it could very much be about death and its absolute inevitability, but equally it could be about life and the role fate plays in it. Just depends on how you read the 'even' part. Using 'even' tends to imply some element of dice (they fall even or uneven), and the laws of probability involved there (50/50, unalterable to make it swing in your favour, etc). However, as Nemoris Inferioris noted there is room to equally encompass elements of getting vengeance, paying your dues, accrued debt that is owing - all of which work within the allegory of gambling, the dichotomy of chance/fate and life/death, and the fact that in the end none of it may even be a dichotomy. The song has a whole has a reflective quality and resignation to it because of this.

[Moderno]

Thanks, you're nice.

Then there isn't a true meaning and everybody can give the title the meaning they consider. I think, reading the lyrics, this: In the previous sentence Manson say: "This is the House of Death. Even angels die in the arms of Demons." with two oposite concepts/things together (angels and demons), in the same way that even and odd numbers. Then I think that with "No one is exempt from the odds of even" wants to say that everybody has posibilities (odds) to experience or suffer something that at first seems imposible.

Do you think thats possible?

[Enname]

Well, I doubt you could go and interpret it as being about 'any' meaning. The title would require some contortion to incorporate something about snails, for instance. Although give me a few minutes and I could patch something together ...

So I don't see why your version is couldn't be possible: although maybe it is enough to say that everyone has the probability of experiencing suffering. After all, even angels have demons (mental, physical, dualities etc), and that everything has to change. Indeed, sometimes demons are just fallen angels.

Think about it like ... you can just hold multiple meanings at once. I like switching between a 'meta' interpretation, one that is fun to play around with the rest of Manson's work. But also sometimes I want a more immediate and intimate interpretation regarding my own experience, or again, in a context of what he has said about it. Each is different, but each fascinating in their own way.

[The Empirical Guy]

I'm not usually one to say what a song is "about" as such as it's up to the listener to interpret it themselves. If English is not your first language though, that can be difficult.

The song does seem to reflect on themes of death, and in English death is often referred to as something of the great equalizer. There are various sayings such along the lines of despite our differences in life, we all have the same graves; or death greets us all in the end, etc. There are probably equivalents in your language. Anyway, death can be seen as the equalizer in that sense and another word for equal is even... so the odds of even is a wordplay (odd and even, in its secondary usage, being opposites), basically saying no-one can escape the fact that we all die in the end.

Hope that helps, but it's always good to try and interpret things for yourself and take your own meaning in to it when you can.

[Moderno]

Oh, thanks, I think I finally understand better the title. I didn't think about the meaning of even as equalizer. Then can we say even is a synonymous of death in a coloquial of urban language? I think it's the explanation I was trying to find. As you say, in spanish there are other words to mention death and if you translate it to english they lose their meaning.

[Moderno]

Now I'm reading a web that I usually use to learn about urban language and I think I got it. This point explains 'even' as synonimous of 'life' and 'death' both...

"3
Even
An unknown action that somehow is necessary to life. Shocking events, positive or negative, sometimes inhibit a person from being able to 'even', resulting in the person 'literally dying'.

Scholars are unsure about what bodily functions are described by the word 'even'.
I'm literally dying because I can't even.

That event that unfolded before my eyes was so startling and against my expectations, that I have lost all my ability to even. Please call an ambulance.
#live #exist #breathe #die #english language"

This is what you say, Empirical Boy? Even means life and death at the same way? It's strange to me, but I think I have the idea...

[The Empirical Guy]

What you are referring to, the saying "I can't even" is a rather recent turn of phrase and not one that I'm sure Manson may be aware of, or use even if he was. It is normally associated with younger (teenage - early twenties) popular girls. It is basically a shortened sentence, as the correct thing to say would be, for example, "it was so intense I can't even handle it" or "can't even deal with it". It's become shortened to just "Can't even" because English is a wonderful language where context can mean more than the actual words. The sentence itself makes no sense whatsoever, but everyone understands what it means.

BTW, if the website you're referring to is Urban Dictionary, it can be good if you're looking up a slang word, but it's not really a good resource for understanding wider language or something like this. Also bear in mind it's freely user edited, so anyone can add in whatever they want.

So know, life and death being synonymous with the word 'even' is not really what I meant, but it's a happy coincidence that kind of applies here, anyway.

[Moderno]

But as I said in the previous post, 'even' is used too as synonymous of death? Or is only an interpretation in the song context?