Clouds in my coffee revisited
So yesterday's post had me up all night. Not because of anything to do with my computer-- still no word on whether they will be able to fix it-- but because I was trying to figure out what "I had some dreams/they were clouds in my coffee" even means. I can't believe I never thought of this before, because seriously, this had me CONSUMED. Why does anyone care who You're So Vain is about (and especially who cares about a pair of grandmas like Mick Jagger and Warren Beatty?) when clearly the real mystery is why would there be clouds in Carly's coffee?
I sort of get that the idea is that she is saying her dreams of love have turned out to be illusory. I mean, that seems to be the point. But what does that have to do with coffee? Is it like she's sitting outside, and the clouds are reflecting in the surface of her black coffee? Or is it like she has milk or something in her coffee, thereby creating some kind of cloudy effect? One way or another, it seems like an incredibly overwrought metaphor, especially when you consider how genius the rest of the song is.
If anyone can provide me with an explanation, I would like to hear it.
I always just assumed it was because Carly took her coffee white (like her men). So, yeah, I think it's just a fairly banal--and certainly opaque--reference to milk. (Perhaps her milk on that particular day was past its expiration date...you know how sometimes, when mixed with coffee, that creates nasty curdly cloud-like things?).
PS: I think you're neat and your blog posts are funny.
repaired? god i fucking hope so!
there must be something in the wind that is blowing those clouds in a Madison sort of way, because last night i was at a party at which someone knocked MY glass over onto a third party's computer (owner of computer was not at home; she had left it out, open, at site of said party). now i am paying for damages.
Clouds in my coffee is only one of several logical errors in this song. Like, obviously the song is about me; I'm the subject of the damn sentence.
Also:
...walking onto a yacht
your hat stra-TE-gically dipped o-ver one eye
your scarf it was apricot
Really? Tortured rhyming, seriously.
Good job getting a blog again. Happy fun time.
oh daniel, you have it so wrong! the flawed logic in the chorus is what makes it such a GOOD song! it's perfect irony. see? the joke is on her and she knows it. that's why i think the clouds in the coffee is so weird, because the song is so lyrically perfect otherwise. (some underworld spy or the wife of a close friend... !!!!) i will give you that the apricot scarf is a bit of a labored rhyme though.
anyway, i promise to post something NOT about carly simon really really soon.
Hmmm, I thought it was, "I had some dreams THERE were clouds in my coffee." In your version, the dreams are the clouds in the coffee. Either way, it seems wannabe Surrealist to me now.
on an airplane last week i was unfortunately led by boredom to this months vanity fair featuring an article on carly simon/joni mitchell et al.
Apparently, carly was in the midst of writing youre so vain, a composite of her experiences with james taylor, mick jagger and leonard cohen. she was riding on a plane with some producer and he pointed to her coffee and said "doesnt that milk look like clouds?"
thats it.
Wasn't that the same producer who convinced her to pose braless on her album cover? Bless him!
I thought "clouds in my coffee" referred to her tears hitting the coffee?
Oh yeah and I'm pretty sure the song is about a combination of men but mainly Warren Beatty, then again this is just speculation based on her 3 decades of vague answers. She's given three letters A, E, & R. She never said the letters all belong exclusively to one person, indicating a possiblity for more than one person... (Also she cleared up Mick Jagger in "son of a gun.")
PS."Son of a Gun" wans't that bad except Missy Elliot should 'just stop'!