Over Now

"Over Now" is about the disintegration of the band, in a "nutshell". The first clue of course, is the dog on the cover. 3 legs, not 4. Layne was already gone, both physically and mentally. He\'d already moved on, leaving the 3 of them to try to keep the table standing (or the dog). Second clue was Taps being played at the beginning of the song, and someone saying "good night." Subtle. :-\\n\nIt was all disintegrating around them by that point. He bluntly says "yeah, it\'s over now," but even with all the drama and stress, he was still breathing. But when the band and everything that was part of it was finished and worn out—and they all knew it—rather than limp onward, he\'d just rather call it a day, and end the band right there. \n\nBeing the straight shooting guy he is, he wanted Layne to at least be man enough to look him straight in the eye and tell him that it\'s over...but I have my suspicions Layne probably never did that. I also suspect Layne had become very passive-aggressive, not wanting to deal with any harshness from Jerry or the others, which is why he distanced himself. But Jerry felt he\'d "paid his debt" to Layne for rescuing him all those years ago, and so he too, was done; his debt was now paid. And with all the crap Layne put them through over the years (and years), Jerry was having a hard time being strong through all that, as Layne constantly had them on shifting sand, where nothing with him was the least bit dependable. Jerry is resigned to the end: "Guess it\'s over now," but though he\'s emotionally drained and devastated, "I seem alive somehow." And when it\'s out of sight (Layne\'s impending death, one assumes), all they can do is "just wait and do your time"—just wait for it to happen eventually. At one point, he even wonders if HE could honestly say that it\'s over, because everything was so up in the air: Were they still a band? What do they do after Layne\'s gone? Where do they go? How do they make a living? They were probably terrified at their prospects, and that the engine they were riding on was being driven straight into a wall. Can you even imagine? The music world is dangerous and fickle. You\'re a star one minute, a has-been the next. \n\nOf course, lots of speculation on my part, but from everything I\'ve gathered, it sounds like things were really tense and unpleasant during the last album. Probably lots of choice words used in anger, maybe regretted later, but couldn\'t be taken back because Layne shut himself away. And of course...no goodbye. Jerry wrote about that too.