[General] What does "jet to jet" mean?

[cebix]

Helllo everyone.

There is one thing that has been bothering me for quite a long time now. There is this song by a band named Alcatrazz called "Jet To Jet". Basically the song is about the arrival of white men in Africa to capture slaves in the 19th century. However I don't exactly understand what does the title mean? What jet? Why jet to jet? The lyric though itself appears in the chorus as "Jet into jet". Maybe it's simple but I just don't get it and it's driving me crazy. For better understanding I'll post a link to a version of the song on youtube. This is no advertisment or anything like that and I'm not the uploader. I'm just curious about the meaning of the title. The whole lyrics are included in the description of the song.

youtube com/watch?v=L5_CqMGsE7E

Thank you in advance for any replies.

 

[5jj]

One does not try to work out English grammar from popular songs.

 

[cebix]

So it just doesn't make sense on purpose?

 

[konungursvia]

One does not try to work out English grammar from popular songs.

I'm not sure I agree with that. One may have a narrow definition of grammar, i.e. speech and writing deemed appropriate at Oxbridge, but grammar is more broadly defined as the set of norms and conventions which enable encoding and decoding in a particular community.

An example: Before writing Brokeback Mountain, Annie Proulx spent something like 2 years in the particular region where it was set to develop an 'ear' for the spoken English there. This includes local grammatical norms.

But if you meant that many lyricists just string together garbage until the meter fits, maybe that's true in many cases.

 

[5jj]

But if you meant that many lyricists just string together garbage until the meter fits, maybe that's true in many cases.

That's all I meant.

 

[cebix]

Well I think this is not the case here. As far as I know this is no popsong made purely for money and actually pretty much all of the lyrics make perfect sense... except for this one line I just don't get it.

 

[Raymott]

"On a short trip we made a landing
Then we were strangers in town
How they stared as we made our exit
We're white they're all brown
Dr. Livingstone where are you when
we need you the most
We're white as ivory on the ivory coast

[1/2CHORUS]
Jet into jet"

A jet is a plane. Jet is a colour - black.
They are flying into (jetting into) a place where black people live (into jet).

That's my guess. If you don't like it, you can Google ' "Jet into Jet" lyrics meaning', and get some other ideas.


"However I don't exactly understand what does the title mean?"
Song titles are poetic. They are not supposed to mean anything 'exactly'. If the lyricist wanted to be unambiguous, s/he would have called it, "White people flying into a place where black people live." (or whatever else they might mean).

 

[cebix]

That's exactly the reply I've been waiting for! I didn't know that jet is also a colour I'm still learning the language. And I've searched google many times for a description and found absolutely nothing. I think you're right and this is what the title means.

Thanks again Raymott!

 

[konungursvia]

"On a short trip we made a landing
Then we were strangers in town
How they stared as we made our exit
We're white they're all brown
Dr. Livingstone where are you when
we need you the most
We're white as ivory on the ivory coast

[1/2CHORUS]
Jet into jet"

A jet is a plane. Jet is a colour - black.
They are flying into (jetting into) a place where black people live (into jet).

That's my guess. If you don't like it, you can Google ' "Jet into Jet" lyrics meaning', and get some other ideas.


"However I don't exactly understand what does the title mean?"
Song titles are poetic. They are not supposed to mean anything 'exactly'. If the lyricist wanted to be unambiguous, s/he would have called it, "White people flying into a place where black people live." (or whatever else they might mean).

I was thinking along the same lines, but my interpretation was "jet (black) to jet (black)", or Black to Black, a communication between Black people.