Seeds of a Nervous System
The genealogy of a song
Tl;dr: Here’s the lyrics and link to dajob’s new single. Please put it on repeat!
Nervous System - lyrics
She lays down before me battered and scarred
Folds on her face
Folds on her waist
She’s on the table with opening sores
Cut to the quick
Cut to the core
She’s a nervous system
A nervous wreck
She’s a nervous system
A nervous wreck
Her trembling hands are always grasping for more
She’s binded herself
She’s locked the door
She’s a nervous system
A nervous wreck
She’s a nervous system
A nervous wreck
She’s kicking up dirt with blood on the ground
She’s hostile, she’s hurt, she’s shot up and down
She’s losing her fight, distraught and rejected
Losing her sight, her eyes are infected
Her thumbs are opposing
Her thumbs are opposing
Her thumbs are opposing
Or are they just posing
America lay in front of me
Her map like a nervous system
She’s a nervous system
A nervous wreck
A nervous system
Nervous System - origin
Part 1 - Inspiration for the name and message:
In 2016 I had the idea to write an updated version of David Foster Wallace’s 2001 article, “Tense Present: Democracy, English, and the Wars over Usage;” a review of a dictionary outlining the lexicographical battle raging in society between the descriptivists and prescriptivists. Without going into the details, this is the moment I first thought of the name, “Nervous System,” as a way to characterize the world swirling around me which was feeling more tenuous each passing day; one large societal nervous system fraying at the edges.
Part 2 - Inspiration for the visual metaphor:
Last year I listened to a song by Bill Callahan called, “All Thoughts Are Prey to Some Beasts.” I had heard it a dozen times before but never really paid attention to the lyrics. I had received the record as a gift years before but had never really understood the title: “Sometimes I Wish We Were An Eagle.” On this occasion I pulled up the lyrics and read: “The leafless tree looked like a brain/ The birds within were all the thoughts and desires within me/ Hoppin' around from branch to branch/ Or snug in their nests listenin' in/ An eagle came over the horizon/ And shook the branches with its sight/ The softer thoughts/ Starlings, finches and wrens/ The softer thoughts, they all took flight….” (I encourage you to read on!) As I read these lines, the whole album opened up to me in a new way. This extremely simple yet profound lyrical picture that Bill created with these lines became for me the pinhole through which I now interpret the entire album. Now when I listen to the song, “Too Many Birds,” I know what those birds represent!
After I had this experience, it became my goal to create a simple picture with the lyrics to one of my songs through which one could understand something bigger, deeper. It was this which led me back to my original Nervous System idea; picturing the map of America on the table before me looking like a nervous system. A nervous wreck.
Sneak Peak - Next single is dropping July 4
