Saturday, November 18, 2017

A Critical Analysis of Car Seat Headrest's Song "Fill In The Blank" As Suggested By Cody Lumpkin With Appearances From Sarte, Kafka, Munch, Mexican Hot Chocolate, and The Velvet Underground

I'm so sick of "Fill In The Blank"
Accomplish more, accomplish nothing
If I were split in two, I would just take my fist
So I could beat up the rest of me

Obviously, our protagonist has come to an existential crossroads where apathy is threating to create a situation of ennui or stagnation—a paralysis, much like the tale of Buridan’s Ass, the donkey who starved to death because he could not choose between two identical bales of hay to eat from. Being sick of everything (where you could just put anything in the blank) is a symptom of Modern living—at least Munch’s “Scream” painting expressed terror at this thought. However, our singer here, despite the driving and illuminative guitar licks and upbeat percussion (thus creating an internal irony in this anthemic song’s progression), is caught between a duality which is in conflict enough for its dominant half, should it choose, to violently attack its other half…and the debate between what can actually, or actually should be, accomplished is in its own slacker cultural ideology, which is problematic. If all progress led us to this world, is progress really that great? Still, the problem here, mainly, is that the singer knows he is possibly about to be split in two, which acknowledges the lack of unity in being, or that self-actualization has revealed the binary, and the singer was not prepared for the revelation…

You have no right to be depressed,
You haven't tried hard enough to like it
Haven't seen enough of this world yet
But it hurts, it hurts, it hurts, it hurts

Although the singer is still in this chorus (he is singing it), it is seemingly sung to the speaker of the lyrics above. Basically, the chorus says “stop your whining, bitch”. If there is more in this world to see, which there most likely always is as long as you can’t breathe underwater and survive the pressures and immense depths, then you can’t make an educated decision about when to “stop trying”. If your one self does punch the other one, as in Stanza 1 above, hopefully, it wakes the comatose other side with its violence so that forward, lateral, or any kind of motion can then once again occur. The declarative “You have no right” is interesting—this suggests an existential responsibility, on a level of Sartre, to the human condition, so to speak.

Well, stop your whining, try again
No one wants to cause you pain
They're just trying to let some air in
But you hold your breath, you hold your breath

“Linger On”, by The Velvet Underground is playing while I write this. It’s 5:02am. I am wearing an old-man sweater and drinking Mexican hot chocolate. In the above stanza, the lyrics address someone who is drowning in isolation, and the possible pain-bringers are really angels and not demons. The healing or transformation is painful, but it must be undertaken. One must “Try again”, or the metaphysical deaths will occur. 

You hold it, hold my breath
I hold my breath
I hold it

The protagonist here, the singer, and the one being “sung to” become one in the same so that the meta-content of the composition is sanctimonious in that the singer does not place himself above the “sung to”. Then, the mirror of shared human experience becomes complete in front of the fuzzing and feedbacking amp as the common garage pumps out its indie rock for the troubled masses (as it should, amen). Also, the implication of “holding one’s breath” is also a metaphor for “holding out for hope”, but waiting in a state of hope too long without action can also drown and kill you. On another note, I could not find the damn marshmallows here for the hot chocolate at my friend's house, and I know I saw some last night—

I've known for a long time I'm not getting what I want out of people
It took me a long time
To figure out I don't know what I want
That's why will be no answer
Then you'll ask for how long? And there will be no answer
Then you'll ask what can I do? And there will be no answer
And eventually you will shut up

And so Sarte said, “Hell is other people”. The protagonist/singer is now realizing the ultimate loneliness of “being with others”, so to speak--the gap which can’t be breached even with the best communication in symbols and language. The irony, as well, of taking a long time to figure out that one does not know because this in itself is a type of knowing. Then, the acts of asking “why” or “how long” or “what to do” become daunting to the singer in the midst of this crisis. Then, silence ensues as a possible answer to the crisis, but this is limp and impotent, and also ironic because the silence being spoken of is being sung to us in the anthem. Also, consider WHO the singer must be expecting an answer from? That could be his problem right there—the answer is most likely intrinsic and not external, if there be an answer at all.

You have no right to be depressed,
You haven't tried hard enough to like it
Haven't seen enough of this world yet
But it hurts, it hurts, it hurts, it hurts
Well, stop your whining, try again
No one wants to cause you pain
They're just trying to let some air in
But you hold your breath, you hold your breath
You hold it, hold my breath I hold my breath I hold it

Repeated reminder—see comments above—nothing seems to have changed just yet…

I get signs from the cops
Saying "Stand the fuck down"
I get signs from the audience
Saying "Stay the fuck out"
I get signs from all
Saying "Stand the fuck down"

Now our speaker is being more specific as to why he feels a lack of access to the answers. In this Kafka-esque stanza, we find the singer expressing isolation as a societal imposition—this is more problematic because the weight of the struggle is from sources beyond the singer’s perceived power to overcome. He also refers to the communication method of those paralyzing him as “signs”—he is almost meme-ed into complacency, but at least, in this stanza, there is angst and anger, and where we find that, there could be hope because possibly it is arguable, in the case of this singer, that misplaced energy or negative energy is better than none at all. Still, the child-like tone of his voice and the sunshiney guitars could be asserting a resurrection of sorts—as if the music of the song itself does not want to die with the ones playing it in their descent into malaise.

I've got a right to be depressed,
I've given up all I had to fight it
I have seen too much of this world, yes
And it hurts, it hurts, it hurts, it hurts
And I will start see the light
That I've seen shining in your eyes
You just want to see me naked

Now, this is interesting—the singer OWNS the experience. This is the responsibility of self-actualization which I mentioned earlier. The sacrifice is alluded to of the fight against depression, and it was ultimate (“I’ve given up all I had”), and the whole world has not been seen but “too much” of it has. Now we are getting more specific; now, we are getting somewhere. The last three lines of this stanza are particularly interesting. The “other” becomes a bit more specific—the “you” is the song’s audience of all of us, but it is also (most likely) addressed to a particular individual—the specific mirror. To say to this “mirror’ being that “You just want to see me naked” could indicate a number of things. 1) It could just be paranoia caused from the psychic break. 2) It could be the singer acknowledging that his confession was elicited from the other. 3) Or, it could be that the other desires to see the singer’s true self, and thus is authentic, and the singer understands that shedding artifice is ultimate trust in the other and maybe a means of salvation (or, in my experience, marshmallows or not, it can also be ultimate destruction).

So I'll hold my breath I hold my breath,
I hold it
Hold my breath I hold my breath,
I hold my breath,
I hold my breath,
I hold my breath,
I hold my breath

Although this holding of the breath would physically or literally result in death for our singer, it is repetitive in such a way that it suggests this particular being can hold its breath for a very long long time—this is a type of anti-heroism and determination, although in the nether or noir sense, like a character in a film who has been poisoned and only has so long to live in the plot but keeps going, but the singer ends the song still alive, albeit not yet functional in terms of completing or participating in the metamorphosis required to leave the state of complacent orbit and enter the realm of explorative propulsion. No more whining, just turn up the amps. There’s a show to be played, always, somewhere.



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