I don’t like violence. I don’t encounter it very often in my life, though as a teacher I have been called upon to break up a fight. But I don’t like to watch it. I can. I have. It’s not the blood and guts that I find repulsive. It’s not the cold-blooded killing, but the hot-blooded killing that scares me the most. Watching anger in one person’s face, and the pain in another person’s face is hard for me to handle. I hope I never have to witness that in person. I don’t understand that feeling- the feeling of wanting to harm someone. It’s not a part of my DNA.
I hope people don’t misunderstand this song. I feel like we live in a time where people take so many things out of context- often intentionally so. If you aren’t paying close attention, you might think that this song is about preparing for battle.
it don’t matter what you break
or who you kill
it’s all okay for the cause.
But that should be the signal to the listener that the person is going down a dark path. When I sing, “We’re letting the beast out of its cage,” that is an acknowledgement by the character that they are about to surrender to a kind of blood-lust. They are not just crossing the line; they are marching across it.
The valley they are descending into is the valley of the human soul- the nadir. It’s fitting that hell is located down below, because we must descend down into a more primitive way of being in order to release ourselves to such violence. In the nadir, human life is worth nothing. It’s like diving into a black hole.
There’s no telling where the rampage is ending
But that’s just a drop
In the ocean
Of the things that you don’t know.
If you hear that and think that the song is advocating for a descent into darkness, then I think you brought he darkness with you. Maybe it’s time to look in the mirror.
About the recording:
This song rocks hard. Once upon a time, I played hardcore music. Once upon a time, I wanted to scream at the top of my lungs and bang my head. This was me trying to get close to that. I think it sounds better than anything that I did when I was younger. I know my limits, so I work around them.
The first musician that I recorded on this (besides myself) was Sam Yost, who played the drums. I’d heard that he was a good drummer, and I thought that a younger drummer might work better for this song. And the Louisville Navigators had yet to form. I had been sitting on the recording for years, when I asked Mike Snowden to play slide on the recording. That’s probably something I wouldn’t have tried when I was younger: slide on a hard rock song. But Mike makes it sound urgent in a cool way. I thought the song was done, but played it for Woody after we had recorded a bunch of songs, and I asked if he had any ideas. He did. They were all good. Lastly, I had my daughter Penelope sing on the album, which was cool since she’s getting into rocking out herself. A little extra youth doesn’t hurt when you’re trying to rock out. Actually, after I recorded everyone else, I re-recorded all my parts. I didn’t want to be the weak-link on my own recording. It can be a bit of a challenge, when you have such talented musicians to play with.
I love Andre McKenna Lee’s mix on this one. Especially the ending. How he got all that chaos to cohere is very impressive. I always send him songs at a point where I have exhausted every idea I have, and somehow it always comes back sounding fresh and new like it was just recorded. Basically, the way you might hear it.