In regards to the meaning of this song:
Before a live performance on the EP Five Stories Falling, Geoff states “It’s about the last time I went to visit my grandmother in Columbus, and I saw that she was dying and it was the last time I was going to see her. It is about realizing how young you are, but how quickly you can go.”
That’s the thing about Geoff and his sublime poetry, you think it’s about one thing, but really it’s about something entirely different. But the lyrics are still universal and omnipresent, ubiquitous, even. So relatable. That’s one thing I love about this band. I also love their live performances, raw energy and Geoff’s beautiful, imperfectly perfect vocals. His voice soothes my aching soul.
Happy new year everybody
Happy birthday country joe
I resolve to do like I always do
There's an overweight man with an overweight woman on a sofa just watching tv
Hes yelling his opinion at the television she looks up from her food and agrees
They got two bumper stickers on there pick up truck
They keep the pick up parked outside
One sticker says "what would Jesus do?"
The other bumper sticker says "power of pride"
I was thumbing through the stations on my own television
When I came across a guy on the religious station
Singing "somebody's coming" sounding whiter than me somehow
Wow
It took me back in time through dwindling joy
To when I was such a guilt ridden catholic boy
I'm evangelical agnostic now
I don't know what we're doing here
You don't "KNOW" what were doing here
Now Christians don't walk out on me just yet
You know whose name I'm yelling as I'm clutching my chest
The one my dad told me to and his told him to
And I probably pray as much or more than you do
Believe? shit, every word I sing
But believing and knowing, those are two different things
And if your trying to change the way a strangers life will have to go
I believe this is where I wanna stick to what I know
Which is nothing you know, nothing for sure so
Just chill til the next episode
Now back to the lecture at hand
Seems like my neighbor wants to kill what he cant understand
I say we cant just kill what we dont understand
But I turn on my tv and see that oh yes we can
We can and we have since then dawn of man
For countless gods whose only real seeming plan
Was to see to it that clinging to life was our fate
And you gotta admit that life's pretty great
But
Can we deny that its killing us?
Ill be here all week
Happy new year everybody
Happy birthday country Joe
I resolve to do like I always do
I ain't hurtin' you
If life is anything its embarrassing
A rusty nail through a careless shoe
You cant help but sit around and wonder sometimes
Why there's never anything the poor nail can do
Or think about how unfair it is
That the shoe is only going where it has to too
If you ain't the dumb kid out running around
You kinda gotta do what your born to do
Hey
Happy new year everybody
Specifically happy birthday to you country joe
I resolve to do like I always do
And I only ever make it a day or two
Happy birthday country joe
I resolve to do like I always do
There's an overweight man with an overweight woman on a sofa just watching tv
Hes yelling his opinion at the television she looks up from her food and agrees
They got two bumper stickers on there pick up truck
They keep the pick up parked outside
One sticker says "what would Jesus do?"
The other bumper sticker says "power of pride"
I was thumbing through the stations on my own television
When I came across a guy on the religious station
Singing "somebody's coming" sounding whiter than me somehow
Wow
It took me back in time through dwindling joy
To when I was such a guilt ridden catholic boy
I'm evangelical agnostic now
I don't know what we're doing here
You don't "KNOW" what were doing here
Now Christians don't walk out on me just yet
You know whose name I'm yelling as I'm clutching my chest
The one my dad told me to and his told him to
And I probably pray as much or more than you do
Believe? shit, every word I sing
But believing and knowing, those are two different things
And if your trying to change the way a strangers life will have to go
I believe this is where I wanna stick to what I know
Which is nothing you know, nothing for sure so
Just chill til the next episode
Now back to the lecture at hand
Seems like my neighbor wants to kill what he cant understand
I say we cant just kill what we dont understand
But I turn on my tv and see that oh yes we can
We can and we have since then dawn of man
For countless gods whose only real seeming plan
Was to see to it that clinging to life was our fate
And you gotta admit that life's pretty great
But
Can we deny that its killing us?
Ill be here all week
Happy new year everybody
Happy birthday country Joe
I resolve to do like I always do
I ain't hurtin' you
If life is anything its embarrassing
A rusty nail through a careless shoe
You cant help but sit around and wonder sometimes
Why there's never anything the poor nail can do
Or think about how unfair it is
That the shoe is only going where it has to too
If you ain't the dumb kid out running around
You kinda gotta do what your born to do
Hey
Happy new year everybody
Specifically happy birthday to you country joe
I resolve to do like I always do
And I only ever make it a day or two
Lyrics submitted by ADimeADexter
Happy New Year Lyrics as written by Todd Daniel Snider
Lyrics © Wixen Music Publishing
Lyrics powered by LyricFind
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I really like this song. I think it's just Todd going out and saying exactly how he feels on these views. He doesn't care if you disagree because they're his views and he's gonna sing them because he's a folk singer and that's what folk singers do.