Thankfully Close Reading

I always think it's impressive how much meaning a single song can convey. One of my favorite bands, Bayside, has songs with often depressing lyrics. The cool thing about them is, many of those same songs are upbeat enough that you can listen to them in any mood, focusing on the lyrics when you're not in a great mood and the music when you're happy.

In their song "Thankfully" there is a shift to a faster tempo and generally less sad music while the following lyrics are sung:

"When we were young we never cared
And now we're scared of jumpin' in,
Like we've forgotten how to swim.
But if we try and if we tread
Then we can teach ourselves again
'Cause it's worth the chance we take.
When we were young we never cared
And now we're scared of jumpin' in
Like we've forgotten how to swim.
But I think that we should try and we should tread
'Cause if we never take another dip again
We'll never know the joy that failure brings"


The connection with swimming is an excellent way to access the emotion they're evoking, especially because for many the fear is irrational and something they don't want to have to be afraid of. The idea is that when you're young you don't think twice being reckless, you're young and fearless. As you get older fear (or something else) takes over and you can't even remember how to be risky anymore. The point that even failure can bring joy validates their point that it's worth learning to at least tread again. The difference in the words "swim" and "tread" is very important, they don't pretend it will be easy or as intuitive as it was originally.

This part of the song does move fast, but not so much that following the words on the first try is too hard. The pace creates a sense of urgency, and other voices join in towards the end making it feel more like a group effort - there's a definite contrast with the rest of the song.

I like how much personal interpretation can be done from these lines. Whatever personal failings or trials one is going through, there is often a fear of no longer being able to "jump in" - at least for many people. Much of this ties into the song as a whole, which questions God and the union that exists within that community and falls apart. Despite some of the sad allusions, it comes back to the point that no matter how bad things get the singer can keep his head up, even when it's his actions or way of handling things that cause him pain.

Adding further context, this song and the album that it's from, "The Walking Wounded," were all written after the band had a car accident and lost their drummer. A lot of the emotion in this album is questioning trying for something, death, general sadness and depressing, as well as moving on and learning to swim again.

I think that music doesn't have the same problem a lot of literature does in conveying meaning. Because in many ways, the emotion is the most important meaning. We've all had the English teacher who couldn't fathom a curtain being green just because the author liked the color green. Music has storytelling properties, but the connection to the emotion is more focused on. I think all good songs can be twisted into one's own meanings, applied to other lives and situations, so much that a song can mean different things to the same person at different times in their life. But, when you do hear what the inspiration or context was, it all makes sense and you can see the artists' perspective. This is why songs are especially great to close read, if the lyrics are written well it's hard to be entirely wrong.