Tom: Am
Am E Am G E
Am E Am G E
Am E
well, i’m afraid that the circles i’ve been drinking myself
Am G E
aren’t big enough for the vowels that i try to fit inside of them.
Am
when i was young, i drank too much,
E Am
and i’d be lying if i said i didn’t feel so goddamn young tonight;
G E
maybe too young to ask what’s on my mind.
F Am
like: if freedom means doing what you want (well),
E Am
don’t you gotta want something?
F Am E
and won’t you tell me that we want something more than just more beer?
and my friends, if that ain’t true, won’t you lie to me tonight?
Am E
well, i’ve been listening to minor threat records all day,
and shit if i do not know every word.
Am G E
i sing along as i tie off.
Am E
and ian screams he’s “out of step” as i throw the cotton into the spoon, draw up into
the syringe.
Am G E
i’ll know just what he means until i hit a vein.
[F Am E]
Am
but after that i won’t have to bother with knowing who i am, for a while at least.
F Am
in a moment the whole world is gonna melt around me,
E
and i’ll swear i don’t miss it as a i lie to you tonight.
C E Am F
because i’m afraid to look the world in the eye.
C E Am F
if nothing’s gonna change, well, then i’d rather die.
C E
and i’m too unemployed to organize a union;
Am F
i’m too intoxicated to tear down a building.
C E
i’m too hopeless to look for a solution;
Am
i’m afraid that if i found one,
F C
i’d be out of excuses for the way i waste away
E Am F
in the gutters that i chose like fashion accessories to go with my dirty clothes.
C E Am
i haven’t bathed in months, but you know it’s not because i’ve been fighting bourgeois morals:
F
i’m just lazy and i’m young.
Am E
i’ve seen the best minds of my generation dying drunk or high from the rooftops to the
parking lots,
Am G E
stomped to death in west philadelphian squats.
Am E
they’ve got me waiting on a day when we can say “fuck the police!” with a little bit of integrity,
Am G E
when it will mean: “i’ve got your back if you’ve got mine!”
[F Am E]
Am
give me a scene where i believe in more than bad hair cuts, guilt, and misery.
F Am
i don’t know where i fit between the vegans and the nihilists.
E
that might be the first thing i’ve said that wasn’t a lie tonight.
C E Am
F
because there’s gotta be something more than lying in the front yard, naked, screaming
at the constellations.
C E Am
F
i want something more than an apology to say when i look the world in the eye.
C E
i’ll tell you, man, my friend william came to me with a message of hope.
Am F
it went: “fuck you and everything that you think you know.
C E
Am F
if you don’t step outside the things that you believe they’re gonna kill you.”
C E Am
he said: “no one’s gonna stop you from dying young, and miserable, and right,
F
but if you want something better, you gotta put that shit aside.”
C E Am
F
i thought about how for thousands of years there have been people who told us that
things can’t go on like this:
C E
from jesus chris to the diggers,
Am
from malthus to zerzan,
F
from karl marx to huey newton,
C E Am F
but the shit goes on and on and on and on and on and on and on and on x 3? (first time
short, second time strum, end on C)
G F
now, i’m not saying that we can’t change the world,
C E Am F
because everybody does at least a little bit of that.
C E Am F
but i won’t shit myself: the way i’m living is a temper tantrum
[C E Am]
F
and i need something else, need something else, need something else to stay alive.
[C E Am F]
(ohohoh.)
[F Am E]
Am
and on the night that i play my last show, i’ll be singing so loud that my heart explodes.
F Am E
and i’ll be singing, and i’ll be singing: we are free!
F Am E Am
oh, but won’t you promise me that we won’t ever forget what the means?
F Am E
i know it’s hard to give a shit sometimes, but promise me we’ll always try.
F Am E
because i don’t wanna hate you, and i don’t wanna hate me,
F Am E
and i don’t wanna have to hate everything anymore.
