Me gustas tu? Manu Chao
Hola,
I have been trying to listen to music in Spanish to help me with comprehension. One of the musicians I have been listening to is Manu Chao.
He has a song called, "Me gustas tu" and he talks about all of the things he likes such as "me gusta bailar y me gustas tu, me gusta soNar y me gustas tu".
My question is this, why isn't it "Me Gusta Tu" instead of "me gustas tu"?
Is he trying to say that "I like you", or is it something else?
Gracias, Roberto
6 Answers
depending on who or what you are talking about liking depends on the ending of the verb, gustarse is reflexive, but it is the pronoun that is the most important to change (me, te, le, nos, os, se) instead of the verb ending, e.g,
me gusta bailar - I like to dance (dance is pleasing to me) te gusta bailar - You like to dance (dance is pleasing to you) le gusta bailar - he/she/it likes to dance (dance is pleasing to him/her/it) nos gusta bailar - we like to dance (dance is pleasing to us) os gusta bailar - you lot like to dance (dance is pleasing to you lot) les gusta bailar - they like to dance (dance is pleasing to them)
if you are only talking about liking one thing the ending stays as -a because it is a singular thing (dance) however if you want to say you like more than one thing for example, I like foot ball and tennis - me gustan el futbol y el tenis, as you can see the ending has changed to -an because you are talking about 'them' and the fact that 'they are pleasing to me'
in terms of the song, me gustas tú is showing the importance of liking you so saying 'te gustas' wouldn't really make sense becaue you're saying 'you are pleasing to yourself' so making the verb completely reflexive doesn't make sense.
a way to remember it is make sure the verb (gustar) agrees with who or whatever is being liked - and the pronoun agrees with whoever you are talking about,
hope that is a bit clearer - my other answer was a bit rushed because it was on my phone, send me a message if it still makes no sense!!
"Gustar" might technically mean "to like" in English, but it's more accurate to say "to please" or "to be pleasing to"
Tú me gustas - You please me.
In that example, "me" is the object in that sentence. The verb should not match "me" because that is not the person doing the verb. "tú" is the subject of that sentence, so the verb should be conjugated to match "tú." Since "gustar" is conjugated in the second person, you don't even need to write "tú" as it can be clearly understood. However, adding it doesn't make it wrong and the singer probably said it to follow the rhythm of the song.
Sorry I didn't have time to hear the song. It looks like it might be interesting; I'll get to it later. Thanks, and I hope this helps 
The difference is that "me gusta la música, me gusta bailar, me gusta soñar, etc" are things or could be objects, rather that a person. That is why it does not follow the same pattern. On the other hand, if you want to use "me gusta" to refer to a person, then you need to change it from informal to formal. "Me gusta usted" but then, part of the "romance" is lost!
Me gustas tú is a way of saying I like you and me gustáis ambas de vosotros/as means I like both of you, Me gustáis vosotros. I like you all.
The correct translation of "Me gustas tú" is "I am attracted to you". "Me caes bien" - "I like you".
The verb gustarse literally means to be pleasing to oneself, so if you say me gusta bailar, it literally translates to to dance is pleasing to me. So here he says 'me gustas tu' to mean you are pleasing to me - or I like you, and he uses the 'tu' to reinforce the fact it is 'you' as in fast speech the 's' sound can often be dropped from a word or joine to the start of the next one, so here it is usedfor clarification.
