They Might Be Giants - Dead

They Might Be Giants have a very particular lyrical style. To put it more accurately, most of their lyrics are perfectly constructed gibberish. Their songs make you believe you're listening to something incredibly profound that lies just beyond your grasp of comprehension, a belief that lasts until you realize most of their lyrics are nothing more than poetic nonsense. Yet occasionally you will come across a lyric that indeed is incredibly profound.

The song 'Dead' from their brand new record for 1990, Flood, is about nothing in particular. An argument can be made that this song is about a tyrannical figure being beheaded and later reincarnated as an expired bag of groceries. Or maybe not. Determining what this song is actually about is just as challenging as trying to understand the plot of a David Lynch film. Even so, for all of the bizarre allusions and stray observations, the chorus contains a line that pretty much sums up existence for most people who have ever lived:

Now it's over I'm dead and I haven't done anything that I want, or I'm still alive and there's nothing I want to do.

This is the battle cry for the rudderless souls who lament the absence of purpose in their lives, even though they have no idea what that purpose should be. The subsequent feeling of regret is only surpassed in strength by the desire to do nothing at all. Perhaps the solution is to have no desires, meaning you can both do nothing and everything at once.