"i dont want you but you dont get to not want me"

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I think this could go both ways in terms if gender. I'm sure in the past I may have said to friends, " I wasn't even bothered, but why did he send his mate round to get his stuff" etc

I Admit i found these lyrics disturbing at first, but then I realised it's more displaying defensiveness due to insecurity rather than abuse. Just a classic break up story really.

I think so - I'm not selling anything.

Hang on then, let me finish this first post :)

I was thinking of starting a blog to dissect chart music from a feminist angle. I've done one post but not sure whether I can keep up with it. Would anyone be interested in reading?

I totally agree with the criticisms of this song on this thread.

Going back to differentnames point though. I get that she shouldn't have promised to be friends with him if she didn't want to be but she could well have been pressured into doing so. I've certainly been. Though most people don't change their number to get away from a normal ex. Most people only change numbers to get away from abusive people.

I don't understand this pressure to "be friends" though. Another friend of mine had this recently. She was under a lot of pressure to be friends with someone who she had had a relationship with and she was in love with but being around him hurt her so she just wanted to cut him out of her life to heal herself. She was really pressurized to try and stay friends even though it was hurting her.

Not sure of my point re this whole paragraph :o just that you don't have to stay friends if you don't want to. I see it very much the same as being able to say no to taking to a man in a bar without being made to feel like a bitch or getting pressure from the man to just be nice and talk to him.

I completely see it as hereigo does.

I can so see her having to say, "yeah, we'll be friends" because he wasn't taking no for an answer.

I've been in relationships like this. I've had an ex call me and angrily shout at me for not having the relationship he wanted to have post break up - one that was all on his terms and where we ended up in bed. I've also had it where an ex thought being friends meant having the same creepy control over my life as he had wanted when we dated, wrapped up in faux concern for me. He did the same to another ex gf of his that ended up being a friend of mine.

I really love this song but can't see it in any other way than the song of an abusive man who is angry at his ex.

I do realize that the song is not the singer though. :)

Another take I have come up with is that he is actually signing to someone else (not Kimbra's character) & she (Kimbra) being his new gf is breaking it off with him because he is still hung up on an ex.

"You said that you could let it go
And I wouldn't catch you hung up on somebody that you used to know"

yeah but sometimes you say you'll be friends with someone because otherwise, they won't let you leave the room.

I agree with you here I go , I just love the song anyway.

I've heard the song and saw an interview of it he seems quite a down to earth guy and wanted to sing about something 'other than the clubs'.

I get the impression its meant to reflect what usually happens in breakups rather than what should.

The chase n status video looks like it might be based on Jeremy Kyle.

I should add that I can see, from her POV, why she 'changed her number' etc. He obv was hung up on her, but she didn't want that.

That other song (Chase & Status), you really need to see the video to get to grip with what the lyrics mean. I have my own ideas, but it is not a man talking about a woman, more like his alter ego, or split personalities. That something has a hold on him & it won't let him go.

I guess we interpret these things differently, but I can't see it how the others do.

I dunno...I kinda of see it as a friendship unrequited thing, tbh.

And I think I have been there...I was (I can't say dumped, cos it wasn't really a relationship), but a guy I wanted for a while didn't want what I wanted, but he promised we'd be friends & for a while we were, but then he made it really hard to contact him & finally - there was nothing. There was no "I don't want you, but you can't have anyone else" just disbelief (because of my naivete) that he wasn't all that into being my friend. And yes, his actions were low. Because he should have been honest & not lied.

So, with that done...

It isn't that he thinks she can't have anyone else, just that he hates the fact that after her promising to be friends (which in reality she doesn't want to do, so says it as lots of people do - to make the break easier for them both) she doesn't want that, but to be able to deal with going forward, he needs that. Even tho he said he felt lonely [in the relationship] & didn't want her love, he still wanted her friendship. And that she was low to promise him he would always have that!

I hope that make sense.

I can't see it in the sense that you see it at all, OP! I quite like the song.

It is, IMO, deeply creepy and odd. The whole tone is very much, "you promised we would still be friends, you acted like you loved me, you broke up with me, which I'm pretending I was happy about but now you're trying to get as far away as possible from me and I don't like it. But I didn't need you anyway."

It just seems so much like those guys who talk about their ex's like they are lying bitches who cheated and lied and were horrible but the truth is that the men are just so angry that the woman doesn't want them anymore.

It's really, really punishing to the ex who doesn't want anything to do with him.

The Chase n status song reminds me of Sting's "I'll be Watching you" Creepy, nasty lyrics.