I think much like another song “Anti-Matter” (that's also on the same album as this song), this one is also is inspired by a horrifying van crash the band experienced on Nov 3, 2022. This, much like the other track, sounds like it's an extension what they shared while huddled in the wreckage, as they helped frontman Garrett Russell stem the bleeding from his head wound while he was under the temporary effects of a concussion. The track speaks of where the mind goes at the most desperate & desolate of times, when it just about slips away to all but disconnect itself, and the aftermath.
December’s traditions
Suck the last of summer from our cheeks
Draw the curtains, strip the trees
In so-called living rooms
Scottish pastimes come to roost
Love’s labour stains a linen sheet
The ghostly body
Who makes his bed beside you
Is slowly losing teeth
The boy needs sunlight
And a shot of modesty
He needs to get some sleep
It’s not the answer
A sticking plaster on a shattered bone
What do you need?
What do you need from me?
It’s not the answer
Keep treating cancer like a cold
What do you need?
What do you need from me?
After months of grieving
Fuck the grief, I’m leaving
Will you leave with me?
The bloodloss, the towering cost
Of mouth to mouth and tongue to tongue
One lick brings warm metallic taste
I may correct myself
Convince you that there’s no-one else
In volumes of new leaves
If you want a saint you don’t want me
It’s not the answer
A sticking plaster on a shattered bone
What do you need?
What do you need from me?
It’s not the answer
Keep treating cancer like a cold
What do you need?
What do you need from me?
It’s not the answer
I’m just begging to be told
What you need
What you need from me
If I had the answer
I’d write a book on what I know
What do you need?
What do you need from me?
Suck the last of summer from our cheeks
Draw the curtains, strip the trees
In so-called living rooms
Scottish pastimes come to roost
Love’s labour stains a linen sheet
The ghostly body
Who makes his bed beside you
Is slowly losing teeth
The boy needs sunlight
And a shot of modesty
He needs to get some sleep
It’s not the answer
A sticking plaster on a shattered bone
What do you need?
What do you need from me?
It’s not the answer
Keep treating cancer like a cold
What do you need?
What do you need from me?
After months of grieving
Fuck the grief, I’m leaving
Will you leave with me?
The bloodloss, the towering cost
Of mouth to mouth and tongue to tongue
One lick brings warm metallic taste
I may correct myself
Convince you that there’s no-one else
In volumes of new leaves
If you want a saint you don’t want me
It’s not the answer
A sticking plaster on a shattered bone
What do you need?
What do you need from me?
It’s not the answer
Keep treating cancer like a cold
What do you need?
What do you need from me?
It’s not the answer
I’m just begging to be told
What you need
What you need from me
If I had the answer
I’d write a book on what I know
What do you need?
What do you need from me?
Lyrics submitted by mariri, edited by rockaction, starvingartist79, Grapevine
December's Traditions Lyrics as written by David William Lawrence Kennedy Andy Monaghan
Lyrics © DOMINO PUBLISHING COMPANY
Lyrics powered by LyricFind
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It's actually STICKY plaster on a shattered bone. That's what they call "band-aids" over there - "sticky plaster". So he's saying; it's not the answer, band-aid on a shattered bone. which fits the song and makes more sense once you know the word. (I used to live over that side of the world, so that's how I know about their name for band-aid.)
No he doesn't mean a plaster as in a band aid, hes referring to Plaster as the material for fixing a shattered bone, plaster is what they use to wrap round something if you break it, it goes solid and holds the bones together, he is saying that it doesnt help because only broken bones can be fixed by plastering it, not shattered bones. And in Scotland they call them plasters, they are not from America