Somebody I Used to Know

The lyrics describe someone looking back on a relationship that was both loving and painful. The speaker admits feeling lonely even while they were together, and says they were glad when it ended. Yet the other person’s sudden, complete rejection still hurts. The emotional movement is mixed: relief at the breakup sits alongside anger, sadness, and a struggle to accept that someone once close is now distant.

“Addicted to a certain kind of sadness” suggests that familiar unhappiness can become hard to leave, even when it causes pain. Being “cut off” means more than ending contact here: it implies being treated as if the relationship never mattered. The collected records and changed phone number are concrete signs of that abrupt separation. “Somebody I used to know” reduces a former intimate partner to a person from the past, though the repeated phrase shows the speaker is still emotionally affected.

The song presents one person’s account, not a complete explanation of the breakup. The speaker feels unfairly blamed and discarded, but also acknowledges the relationship was troubled and that ending it brought relief. The lyrics leave open whether the former partner’s distance is cruel, a way of setting boundaries, or both. That tension helps explain why the speaker insists they do not need the other person’s love while continuing to dwell on the rejection.