This song is disturbing..."haunting" in the best sense of the word. Merritt is a remarkably clever songwriter always, but this song stands out as having an apropos (and beautiful) arrangement and sound to match its lyric.
Though Stephin is often the narrator of his songs (it would seem), in this case the voice is of someone else, I believe. (Or at least, Stephin wondering what it would be like to be someone else.)
Compare this to "I Have the Moon" from the same album (clearly his own voice), and the difference is obvious. The common thread, perhaps, is that he is always part of a tribe of night people. (Also coming to mind is "Save a Secret for the Moon", where the dichotomy between day/night--and their associated societies--is explicit.)
It's almost impossible not to assume all of the drifters are men. Being familiar with Merritt's songwriting, it's tempting to lend significance to this fact, but in this particular case it may not be important. One senses the (nebulous) setting is in a past, which would be a time when few women worked or traveled alone. It is more relevant that all of the drifters are outcasts...yet not entirely outsiders, as they do "belong", if only within their hazy, diminished subculture of the damned.
I hear an overwhelming sense of slowly approaching doom, an impression skillfully created here.
foreverdroneon August 21, 2007 Link
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