“Blood & Water” by Memphis May Fire

We don’t know much about Memphis May Fire at this point, this being the first time we’ve ever covered the crew. But according to their fans, they tend to ‘make anthems for the broken’. And yes, on this particular outing (“Blood & Water”) the vocalist is taking on the role of a victim. And what he’s a victim of is being caught up in a toxic relationship. And reading between the lines, there are some specific aspects of his association with his abuser, the addressee, that can be ascertained.

For instance he or she is the type of individual who rather likes to ‘think they’re the martyr’. What a statement like that alludes to, in the grand scheme of the song, is that whereas said individual is an abuser, in his own mind he prefers to think of himself as the victim or righteous or something like that. 

And anyone who has ever dealt with such an individual, the self-righteous type who in reality is toxic, could likely attest to the fact that they tend to be the worst kind of oppressors.

Said individual is also presented as being manipulative. And it is such that s/he has a powerful influence over the vocalist, whereas he has been susceptible to this type of treatment for years on end. Indeed the lyrics imply that he caught on to the sheisty nature of the addressee a long time ago. But this person is so close to his heart that the cycle just repeats itself, as in the vocalist continually being “fooled” by the addressee. 

So it’s now only that the singer is really like he’s not going to tolerate this sequence of events any longer.  And along those same lines, he also seems to have concluded that if deading the relationship altogether is necessary to achieve that goal, then so be it.

And truth be told we have come across a number of songs which centered on this same theme, albeit most of them being romantic contextually. But what makes this one different is that Memphis May Fire actually implies that this addressee we’ve been dogging all along is in fact a family member of the vocalist. 

Such is the metaphor which the title of the song indirectly points to. Or as Mullins puts it in the track, he has come to realize that “blood is not thicker than water after all”. And undoubtedly, you’ve heard the age-old adage ‘blood is thicker than water’ before.  What that statement means, based on its own logic, is that ideologically familial relations would be stronger than all others. Well, Matty may have felt that way at one point in time. But now after getting to know the addressee good and well, such is not the case.

So all of that considered, we have to conclude that this song centers on a falling out between two family members. Or more specifically one of them, the vocalist, has decided that he can no longer deal with the other. He also kinda implies that said other may have been intentionally trying to destroy their relationship or in the very least didn’t really give AF either way.

But contrastingly, the singer is the kind of person who  wishes that things weren’t so. Indeed this decision to cut off the addressee isn’t one he came to overnight, but ultimately come to it he has. And as painful or undesirable making this choice may be on his part, he knows the time has come to permanently move on.

Memphis May Fire

Memphis May Fire aren’t from Tennessee but rather a part of Texas known as Denton. They have been around since 2006 and have experienced quite a few personnel changes during the early goings. But since 2010, leading up to the release of this track on 4 June 2021, their lineup has been for the most part steady, consisting of the following:

• Matty Mullins
• Cory Elder
• Jake Garland
• Kellen McGregor

McGregor has been down with the crew from day one.

They have also released six albums up to this point, with “Blood & Water” expected to be the lead single from their seventh. And out of all of the previous undertakings, 2014’s Unconditional has proven most-successful. It topped Billboard’s Mainstream Albums chart and was rose to number 4 on the Billboard 200.

Memphis May Fire created “Blood & Water” under COVID-19 pandemic circumstances. And they are donating part of the proceeds associated with the track to an NGO called Bridges DVC Nashville, which deals with victims of domestic violence, the topic this song is sorta based on.