Most musicians use poetic devices in their music to makes their songs more meaningful. Irony, is used to make people think about the situation that they are singing about, when the opposite of what is expected happens. Imagery is supposed to appeal to your senses, and make you picture scenes. Characterization conveys the thought that the song has different characters that have different feelings. Showing oxymoronic statements in “Funny the Way It Is,” Dave Matthews Band utilizes destructive imagery, straightforward irony and sorrowful characterization to portray contradicting scenarios.

Dave Matthews Band’s song, “Funny the Way It Is,” has a lot of destructive imagery. The singer says, “Someone’s house is burning down on a day like this,” before that, he explains a beautiful sunny day that seems very happy and serene. You can picture the beautiful day and it is quite upsetting to imagine someone going through such horror of their house burning. Another lyric that you can imagine is “A bomb blast brings a building crashing to the floor.” As you listen, you can see the bomb dropping. You can also feel the terror and see the reaction of the bystanders. Dave Matthews Band uses imagery to make you see the destructive and disturbing things that people have to go through.

Musicians use irony to show contradicting scenes is their songs. In “Funny the Way It Is,” Dave Matthews Band has a lot of ironic scenes. Most of the imagery shows these. The lyrics, “On a soldiers last breath, his baby’s being born,” are very ironic because you usually wouldn’t want to associate a father’s death with his baby’s birth. You would think that someone would be very unlucky to have this happen, and that makes this ironic. Another part of the song says “A kid walks 10 miles to school, another’s dropping out,” Those lyrics are very ironic to think about because one child is trying so hard to be a good student, and to get to school, while the other could care less. Also, one the child who dropped out, might have better advantages over the good student, and could easily get to school. There are many ironic scenarios in Dave Matthews Band’s song “Funny the Way It Is”

Through the lyrics, characterization portrays the characters as sorrowful. When the singer says “Somebody’s heart is broken and it becomes your favorite song” it shows characterization because some musician’s best songs come out of troubled relationships. When they go through a heard breakup, they write very meaningful and soulful lyrics, which tend to appeal to many people. Also, “Someone is screaming and crying in the apartment upstairs,” characterizes someone as scared or in pain. It shows that someone could be going through something that is terrorizing to them. Most of the characters in this song seem to be upset, or worried about something.

The song, “Funny the Way It Is” uses a lot of poetic devices and shows specific scenarios to let the listener understand the meaning clearly. The meaning of the song is very ironic, and most of the lyrics are already easy to understand. The poetic devices and lyrics are very concise, and they complement each other very well so the listener understands. Showing oxymoronic statements in “Funny the Way It Is,” Dave Matthews Band utilizes destructive imagery, straightforward irony and sorrowful characterization to portray contradicting scenarios.