Check It Out

As a 22 year old feeling as though I'm standing in the crossroads of childhood to adulthood, this is what this song means to me.

It means you've grown up without really knowing how, you've reached a point that's come too quick, and now you're trying to analyse your life. Maybe the next generation will be able to explain this motion better than we can? Maybe we are the ones who have to educate them about this sudden rush of emotional growth? Maybe it will never get easier to explain, and everyone is destined to be stuck in the same place at this age.

I think that this song focuses on the American dream and its disappointments.

Since we are children, we are told that we are going to grow up, get married, have kids, have a job, buy a house, etc. This is the American dream. Then when we get there, we're not happy, and we're confused and trapped by a mortgage, marriage, and kids.

Goin' to work on Monday Got yourself a family All utility bills have been paid You can't tell your best buddy that you love him So check it out Where does our time go Got a brand new house in escrow Sleepin' with your back to your loved one This is all that we've learned about happiness

"I hope they have a better understanding..." embodies hope for the next generation to really find out what makes them happy, rather than following the formula of the "American dream."

That's always what stood out to me anyway. :)

Another under-appreciated classic. I love the line "Can't tell your best buddy that you love him". It just sums it all up. We think we have it all figured it out, but really we don't. Sometimes when you are transitioning into manhood, it feels like we're pretending, or "playing house", and really it's those simple things that make us men.

I think this song is about the disillusionment of growing up, family, responsibility, and the chase of The American Dream.

The first stanza is a commentary on the idealism of younger generations versus the desire of the rest of us who are "living to be heard", or wanting to feel like their lives are important or mean something more than the mundane existence they are in.

The first part of the chorus goes over the typical "American Dream" scenes: family, marriage, home, bills, losing touch with old friends, and career. It also illustrates that this is all we know and this is the life we have built for ourselves because of that. In other words, the epitome of happiness in our minds.

The second part of the chorus goes over the things we forget about when we are in the grind of daily life: neighbors and friends. It goes over the things we do to try to feel young. Men talk about girls and what they could of had. It also illustrates the typical things we do to unwind and relax, and comments again on, this is all we know and this is the life we have built for ourselves.

The last part of the song revisits the commentary from the first of the song and issues a challenge to younger generations: to try to understand what happiness really is, seek to find it, and never be pigeon-holed into the life that we THINK we should be in.

I agree with so much of what you've all said above, especially the last two. However, I think there's less focus on the "disillusion" and more on the "all that we know" simpleness of small town life across this country. Time flies by and before you know it.....

I remember when this song and the others from The Lonesome Jubilee were on rock radio, late 80s, this song specifically seems JCM was lowering the anger and attitude in his music and going for a more inner-searching sound, if that makes sense. Check It Out is so melancholy... Heard this today, first time in a while, and it never fails to make me happy with a tinge of sadness, which I feel is the point of the song in a way - we laugh and have good times, but question if we could be better people. Brilliant, one of his best, maybe my fave from JCM, along with Minutes To Memories and Crumblin' Down.

I don\'t know, but I was 21 and didn\'t know it. Wish I could relive those days. Thats song and LP was the soundtrack of my youth. wow. just wow. to have lived and experienced that at that age. I was there. Wish for a moment to go back to when that was on the jukebox and I was 21. thanks JCM. He actually autographed my Lonesome Jubilee poster. Forever grateful. Keith Stevens

As a 53 year old man that has worked since he was 12. I look back on life and all the things the Lord has blessed me with. This song sums up going through the motions that outwardly look mature and responsible to the world, while inwardly we are who we think we are supposed to be instead of our true selves. Can't tell your buddy that you love him, a man has to seem tough, not mushy right? Society has stereotypes for all of us and without even trying we fall right into those things. Check it out, it happens every day.

About growing up.