Nightshop

I get the impression thas this is about the emptiness of our current climate, how we are basically told through advertising, the goverment etc. what to think, do, eat etc. The narrator just wants something real and concret to believe in. One of my favourite Fugazi songs.

"Fuck your fucked directives God, I want a new invective"

The beginning verses play out like a conversation, either between the singer and society or a friend, and this reads to me like a friend complaining about the "directives" or values (lack thereof) of a capitalist society. Hence, the 2nd line where the singer is wanting something new to believe in.

"Custom built to form-fit you Say it to your face If I get to choose I'll take something real The fight to feel While your next meal is calling"

The singer wants something real, some value or moral or belief that isn't money, or any other physical material thing. The last line "Your next meal" is the singer speaking to their friend (or audience), criticizing that exact appetite, that people don't care for values, only feeding themselves.

"Loosely trademarked as the best fucking thing You've had inside your mouth All comet-cleaned and scrubbed down Landscaping for a ghost town"

The meal is the best thing you have had, but not really, it only says so. And what you are putting in your mouth, has been cleaned and processed and landscaped for your body, which since it consumes only food without standards, is a ghost-town.

"While that deficient platform for your head Causing you to mistake yourself for dead and all that you would issue Is Capital's incontinence casing you embarrassment?"

Deficient being incomplete, or lacking, whatever the platform is, it is empty, and since that is something 'they' put in your head, it fills your head with nothing important.

Mistaking yourself for dead feels like without personal morals you don't feel whole, and instead fill your life with materialism making you dead inside. You have a problem with that, and as such blame "Capital's Incontinence". Incontinence is when a urinary infection leaks pee. [doesn't fugazi have more lines about urine? like an odd amount...]

"The wet spot on the carpet that you leave As the reminder that you need Of all that it did to you"

The wet spot is a continuation of the Incontinence of capitalism, but this time I feel it takes on a physical metaphorical role. The damp spot is something the singers friend or rather YOU left as a reminder that capitalism did this to you.

"Adjusting your reception A welcome self-correction Make it quick, make it soon Make it something I can do all by myself"

Adjusting your reception reads to me akin to adjusting your views on life, or reception to society, and then making corrections to your behavior as an improvement. Sounds like them celebrating their changes by doing it themselves.

"'Cause there's a brain inside it There's a brain inside the brain deciding Time to make or break Find me somewhere else Time to make or break How about it?"

You can figure this one out, the break is about the only stable thing, aka change, the brain is in conflict with itself, but it decides inevitably. Most people already make up their minds before they do something. You could also say this is the singer convincing their friend to make a change "How about it?" Other things going on here I feel would be obligatory to write down.

"I've got no patience No way stationed Hanging at the nightshop eating shit"

Even less patience then before? They already wanted to change quickly, or get fast food, now they're doing both? [Fugazi loves playing patience don't they? I'm still stuck in the waiting room]

"Who works for who? Every asshole says Side-saluting emptiness instead

But, if I get to choose I'll take something real

Who works for who? Who you working for? Who works for who? Who you working for?"

Side-saluting? The people who rhyme with Yahtzee would be proud. They are worshiping emptiness and appetite and materialism without asking why. Without asking who they work for, or rather, why they work.

[Edit: Better]