This post is part of the ongoing blog breakdown series where I dive into the official lyrics, stories and thoughts that inspired the lyrics for the recently released Throughfare EP. If you haven’t yet, give the record a spin on bandcamp and jump back to the first blog on this record by clicking this handy link.
Today we’re talking about track 5 on the record: Drift.
Listen to the album in full on bandcamp!
Stream “Drift” and then read on for the official lyrics and my blog breakdown.
Drift (Official Lyrics)
Lying here
In this empty room
Watching the rays
Shift into hues
You think you know
What’s best for you
Til it hits what you never knew
I feel you press
Into my chest
In an instant
I forget
All the things you didn’t say
What it meant when you wouldn’t stay
Out of sorts
Over the line
How to leave this all behind
To be sure
And then so blind
As shadows creep over yours and mine
If I could
Go back today
I’d remind you how far you came
And the end, I’d try to change
So that you don’t feel the same
As it sets
I start to drift
Caught between what is and if’s
I turn the dial
Rewind the time
All the while
What’s on your mind
I compress
Throw into fits
Losing place
With every rift
Drawing blanks
I retreat
Into your head and out of me
Out of sorts
Over the line
How to leave this all behind
To be sure
And then so blind
As shadows creep over yours and mine
If I could
Go back today
I’d remind you how far you came
And the end, I’d try to change
So that you don’t feel this way
If the first 4 tracks off this EP focused more on the challenges and difficulties of merely existing and navigating towards our place in the world, Drift takes a look back at where we’ve been with a reluctant acceptance.
Right off the top we find ourselves letting the day pass us by, stuck replaying what led us back to this room and the realization that we’re still not as smart as we feel we should be and have made some sort of misjudgement (again).
Sort of how like on our last blog breakdown we talked a bit about how it seems some things can be fixed easily with simple changes but, there are so many factors that play into how easy or difficult that can really be and until you understand that, there is entirely too much that you will never appreciate about yourself or others.
Almost as quickly as we’re brought to this place we’re reminded of what’s important to us and that it’s probably not worth dwelling on what was said or not said, and whatever reason we’ve dreamt up in our own heads about how or why things played out the way they did. We’re met with an embrace and that’s enough to halt the cycle of negative thinking.
But before we’ve had a minute to really sit with that, the chorus again brings us back to where we began in the first verse because whatever has occurred has crossed too long of a line. We’d like to let go and move on and move forward, but how?
We start to figure out how a little better in verse 2 where we muster up enough energy to stop thinking about ourselves and begin thinking more about someone else and how they might be feeling instead.
Being so stuck within ourselves is enough to make us lose control of ourselves and diminish our outlook; We know we can’t stay in this place of regret and despair because it’ll only continue to spiral downwards.
Almost as a prelude now to our chorus refrain, we start to think about what we could have done differently in an effort to avoid this experience altogether; not for our own sake but for those involved and caught in the crossfire. But this exercise is an ill-fated one and leaves us feeling worse than before.
The chorus ends with our one hope, if we had some sort of time machine or ability to change the past, all we’re sure of is that we’d do whatever we can to make sure that the people we love the most don’t feel as terrible as we do in this moment. If they’d thought they’d done something wrong or didn’t feel they were enough, we’d try to remind them of all the great things they have to offer us, themselves and the rest of the world.
And as I wrap up this series, I try to remember to offer that same thinking to you and I.
However you feel right now is valid and no one can take that away from you.
Wherever you are right now might not be where you want to be, but you still have time to get there.
Thanks very much for listening to the Throughfare EP, I hope you found something you liked from it.
Heads up, I have a new cover song that’s officially streaming everywhere you stream stuff today – we’re keeping it festive with a subdued cover of Elvis Presley’s “Blue Christmas”.
Crooked Forest 