Bright Eyes – Let’s Not Shit Ourselves (To Love and Be Loved)

Album:
Lifted or The Story Is in the Soil, Keep Your Ear to the Ground
Year :
2002
RIYL :
Elliott Smith / M. Ward / Deer Tick

Well, this song. I’d wager that it’s one of the only 10 minute+ songs that I can truly and honestly sit through without meandering off.  It starts out like some sort of square dancing hootenanny (“Tonight here’s a goddamn song for all you goddamn people!”) and keeps that tempo and energy going for pretty much the entire run. Lyrically, though, this thing is just spiteful.

There’s such piss and hate to this song, vented in all directions. Each verse seems to blend some personal experience with anecdotal self-loathing. Consider the first verse, where the narrator of “Let’s Not Shit Ourselves” states that the city’s driving him out of his mind is immediately followed by the image of a child falling off the lowest branch of the apple tree. ”Next time he will not aim so high / Yeah next time neither will I.”  Jesus.

This is paralleled in the next verse with the equally dire “Ambition I’ve found can lead only to failure,” though this time it’s followed up with defiance. ”I do not read the reviews / No I am not singing for you.”  It’s practically a manifesto. This spirit continues, directed at capitalism, education, the media, and “cowboy presidents” (in the process placing this song firmly in the aughts).  It comes to a head with another absurdly quotable line: “Red blooded, white-skinned, oh and the blues / Oh and the blues, I got the blues, that’s me!”  And so it turns inward.

The last two verses find the narrator recovering in a Chicago hospital after an overdose on whiskey and pills. In the daze of the hangover, he realizes how far removed he’s become, recalling his young ideals with a tinge of lost hope.  The lyrical rage is gone, replaced by resignation. Through it all, though, the song keeps on rocking. It may not match the lows that Connor Oberst reaches, but it’s consistently and extrinsically fun as hell. After ten exhausting, exhilarating minutes, let’s just hope that is enough.



Buy This Song :

  • Buy Now on Amazon
Jeff Bennet (@JeffBennet) goes with Drake any time someone asks him who his favorite band or artist is, because he has this personality flaw where he needs to be all things to all people.

Comments are closed.