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.
We believed it was time to lift off from the land of vertigo
The captain said "despite the wind and tide, you will have to row."
Will that mean that the ones who do not wish to row won't wish to go?
Maw was mawkish cause the house we'd left we'd surely never know again.
We search for planets where the land won't be the kind you have to sow.
We left behind pernicious minds and fancy lies.
"i'm really gonna miss you - you and your mom,
i got real used to how it feels to have a kind of family again,
my mom left us when we were all six.. i mean when i was six.
i told you about that once. remember that - when i told you about that?
that one day in the park, on the bench. you had that green skirt on
and it was one of those days when the sky was really blue in your eyes
like it gets sometimes. i told you that didn't i? on certain days when
you were real clear, how you... a, i don't know that there's any words for it,
but you were always the clearest one of us. with you gone,
it's like my balance is off or something... god, i miss you. you're like
a little bit of God to me. everybody needs a little God. you were that to me-
you and your mom. you were like the family i needed. please come back to vertigo.
i think i need you here. please come back to vertigo. i need you here."
"everyone's been kind of acting sad or strange lately around here.
things already seem different just knowing you're leaving.
yesterday i was talking to sheila. she's pregnant again, you know.
she started crying when i told her about you leaving. you helped her so
much when annie was born. she kept saying how she doesn't know what to do
(i'm glad i was the only one there actually). i would have been a little
embarrassed for her otherwise. oh, and greg, i'm scared about him, hon, he
seems like... like he might do something crazy. he keeps saying stuff about
how his balance is off - weird things like that, and he just sort of spaces
off, not like his normal thing. it's like all the time now. i'm worried.
if you were here, i think... well, you're not though... you know, there's
one thing that i don't get about you leaving. i never saw you falling for
all that captain stuff - all that business about new worlds and all. i mean
really, i'd hate all that rowing and order taking, and you, well, i always
thought you were more the free spirit type. why don't you just quit all this
leaving business and come back to vertigo. we'd still have a place for you."
We'd thought it so dreamy the way it spun our time.
Everything was so easy if we hid behind the lies.
That made us seem leavened made us reel we were usually tripping
Till we couldn't feel but our souls were just dripping out all that was real.
All you sinners
All you spinners
All who love
The winding roads
Who love vertigo
It's time to board
Or be lost to the undertow
Thank God I get I get to go away from vertigo
The captain said "despite the wind and tide, you will have to row."
Will that mean that the ones who do not wish to row won't wish to go?
Maw was mawkish cause the house we'd left we'd surely never know again.
We search for planets where the land won't be the kind you have to sow.
We left behind pernicious minds and fancy lies.
"i'm really gonna miss you - you and your mom,
i got real used to how it feels to have a kind of family again,
my mom left us when we were all six.. i mean when i was six.
i told you about that once. remember that - when i told you about that?
that one day in the park, on the bench. you had that green skirt on
and it was one of those days when the sky was really blue in your eyes
like it gets sometimes. i told you that didn't i? on certain days when
you were real clear, how you... a, i don't know that there's any words for it,
but you were always the clearest one of us. with you gone,
it's like my balance is off or something... god, i miss you. you're like
a little bit of God to me. everybody needs a little God. you were that to me-
you and your mom. you were like the family i needed. please come back to vertigo.
i think i need you here. please come back to vertigo. i need you here."
"everyone's been kind of acting sad or strange lately around here.
things already seem different just knowing you're leaving.
yesterday i was talking to sheila. she's pregnant again, you know.
she started crying when i told her about you leaving. you helped her so
much when annie was born. she kept saying how she doesn't know what to do
(i'm glad i was the only one there actually). i would have been a little
embarrassed for her otherwise. oh, and greg, i'm scared about him, hon, he
seems like... like he might do something crazy. he keeps saying stuff about
how his balance is off - weird things like that, and he just sort of spaces
off, not like his normal thing. it's like all the time now. i'm worried.
if you were here, i think... well, you're not though... you know, there's
one thing that i don't get about you leaving. i never saw you falling for
all that captain stuff - all that business about new worlds and all. i mean
really, i'd hate all that rowing and order taking, and you, well, i always
thought you were more the free spirit type. why don't you just quit all this
leaving business and come back to vertigo. we'd still have a place for you."
We'd thought it so dreamy the way it spun our time.
Everything was so easy if we hid behind the lies.
That made us seem leavened made us reel we were usually tripping
Till we couldn't feel but our souls were just dripping out all that was real.
All you sinners
All you spinners
All who love
The winding roads
Who love vertigo
It's time to board
Or be lost to the undertow
Thank God I get I get to go away from vertigo
Lyrics submitted by ThreeMilesDown
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Great version of a great song,
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I apologize for how blocky this song is, y'all...i've played around with it, and i think that this is the best way to present it.