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.
In this dirty old part of the city
Where the sun refuse to shine
People tell me there ain't no use in trying
Now my girl you're so young and pretty
And one thing I know is true
You'll be dead before your time is due
I know
Watch my daddy in bed and tired
Watch his hair been turning gray
He's been working and slaving his life away
Oh yes, I know it
He's been working so hard
I've been working too babe
Every night and day
Yeah yeah yeah yeah
We gotta get out of this place
If its the last thing we ever do
We gotta get out of this place
'Cause girl, there's a better life
For me and you
Now my girl you're so young and pretty
And one thing I know is true, yeah
You'll be dead before your time is due
I know it
Watch my daddy in bed and tired
Watch his hair been turning gray
He's been working and slaving his life away
I know
He's been working so hard
I've been working too babe
Every day baby
Yeah yeah yeah yeah
We gotta get out of this place
If its the last thing we ever do
We gotta get out of this place
Girl, there's a better life
For me and you
Somewhere baby
Somehow I know it baby
We gotta get out of this place
If its the last thing we ever do
We gotta get out of this place
Girl, there's a better life for me and you
Believe me baby
I know it baby
You know it too
Where the sun refuse to shine
People tell me there ain't no use in trying
Now my girl you're so young and pretty
And one thing I know is true
You'll be dead before your time is due
I know
Watch my daddy in bed and tired
Watch his hair been turning gray
He's been working and slaving his life away
Oh yes, I know it
He's been working so hard
I've been working too babe
Every night and day
Yeah yeah yeah yeah
We gotta get out of this place
If its the last thing we ever do
We gotta get out of this place
'Cause girl, there's a better life
For me and you
Now my girl you're so young and pretty
And one thing I know is true, yeah
You'll be dead before your time is due
I know it
Watch my daddy in bed and tired
Watch his hair been turning gray
He's been working and slaving his life away
I know
He's been working so hard
I've been working too babe
Every day baby
Yeah yeah yeah yeah
We gotta get out of this place
If its the last thing we ever do
We gotta get out of this place
Girl, there's a better life
For me and you
Somewhere baby
Somehow I know it baby
We gotta get out of this place
If its the last thing we ever do
We gotta get out of this place
Girl, there's a better life for me and you
Believe me baby
I know it baby
You know it too
Lyrics submitted by magicnudiesuit
Add your thoughts
Log in now to tell us what you think this song means.
Don’t have an account? Create an account with SongMeanings to post comments, submit lyrics, and more. It’s super easy, we promise!
More Featured Meanings
Dreamwalker
Silent Planet
Silent Planet
When We Were Young
Blink-182
Blink-182
This is a sequel to 2001's "Reckless Abandon", and features the band looking back on their clumsy youth fondly.
Blue
Ed Sheeran
Ed Sheeran
“Blue” is a song about a love that is persisting in the discomfort of the person experiencing the emotion. Ed Sheeran reflects on love lost, and although he wishes his former partner find happiness, he cannot but admit his feelings are still very much there. He expresses the realization that he might never find another on this stringed instrumental by Aaron Dessner.
Punchline
Ed Sheeran
Ed Sheeran
Ed Sheeran sings about missing his former partner and learning important life lessons in the process on “Punchline.” This track tells a story of battling to get rid of emotions for a former lover, whom he now realized might not have loved him the same way. He’s now caught between accepting that fact and learning life lessons from it and going back to beg her for another chance.
Somewhere Only We Know
Keane
Keane
Per the FAQ on Keane's website, Keane's drummer Richard Hughes, stated the following:
"We've been asked whether "Somewhere Only We Know" is about a specific place, and Tim has been saying that, for him, or us as individuals, it might be about a geographical space, or a feeling; it can mean something individual to each person, and they can interpret it to a memory of theirs... It's perhaps more of a theme rather than a specific message... Feelings that may be universal, without necessarily being totally specific to us, or a place, or a time..."
With the nostalgic sentiment and the overall tone of the song, I think Keane is attempting to express a Portuguese term known as 'saudade', which does not have a direct English translation but roughly means "that which we remember because it is gone."
Vietnam?... maybe on one level. But Eric and the band came out of working class roots in the grey industrial wasteland of north-east England. "In this dirty old part of the city" speaks to me more about personal experiences in Newcastle, Sunderland and Middlesbrough of the 60s rather than the jungles of a far off land Britain wasn't involved in.
this commentary about how the 'civilized' world is rife with slums and toil really hits home in my heart. i hate the city and pray one day that it will all be abolished, so we may all return to rural lifestyle. the bucolic call of the wild, howling to turn off your computer and get back to basics. the beauty of the girl in this song demands an escape from dirt.
A desire to escape your prescribed fate and stike out for something better.
See also Bruce Springsteens: Thunder Road for a simerlar theme (if not style)
I know this song is more about society than the war, but when I hear it, it makes me think of the soldiers in vietnam thinking the war is pointless, and "We gotta get out of this place." I am only 16 but listening to classic rock and watching movies like "Platoon" and "We were soldiers" makes me feel like I was almost a part of the war. I know what I am feeling is nothing like what people who lived through it felt, and I admire all of you who did.
P.S. Those two movies are great. I would highly suggest watching them. They are great war movies, up there with "Patton" and "The Longest Day"
wen i saw 'the animals and friends' they said this song was dedicated to the young people who fought in the veitnam war and it was number one for 3 years in some kind of army chart i cant remember its name
It doesn't surprise me why...Vietnam was hell for those men.
Listen the 8th of November by Big & Rich Still in Saigon by Charlie Daniels Band Rooster by Alice in Chains
Yeah, it's an Urban Blight Song, like The Temptations "Cloud Nine" and Stevie Wonder's "Just Enough for the City" (OK-that was Urban AND Rural Poverty, along with Racism.)
But, it looks like the 'Nam Vets took it for their Own. In Contrast to the myriad Protest Songs (such as The Animals own "Sky Pilot") the Soldiers who were actually IN Vietnam fighting had their Own faves. Some, like "Incoming" Civilians can't identify much with. There was a similar Billy Joel Song. And I'm sure "Okie from Muscogee" was on their Hit List, too.
"Orange Crush" by REM was pruportedly about Agent Orange. And, YES, "Rooster" perhaps The Greatest Grunge song-EVER-was written by the AIC lead Guitarist-whose Father fought in the War and did Not discuss it for years afterward.
a vietnam favourite too, i might add...
They used this in HAMBURGER HILL as well.
Keep it mind, aside from the draftees, most Vietnam vets were there because they wanted to be. Remember these were the people who grew up listening to Kennedy about "asking not what their country can do for them, but what they can do for their country."
As a result, you have many people signing on for multiple tours of the RVN. One man, I believe, spent seven straight years there working with the indigenous highlanders. Devotion to the cause was always higher among Special Forces personnel and also Marines...
Awesome song, anyway.
do you think he is dating the girl he is singing about? i mean it is WE gotta get out of this place, but he could be talking about its little sister or somethig tbh. idk whady reckon? xxx
On the whole, both the language and content of the song suggest it's his girlfriend rather than sister. Saying "MY daddy"; and telling her things that his sister would know as well as he, such as how hard he and his father have been working. How hard he works is the kind of thing a guy is likely to tell his girlfriend, not his sister.<br /> <br /> But the song being sung to his sister is supportable too. The image of her tending his father in his sick bed and the gradual realization that this could be them in twenty or thirty years is a powerful one.<br /> The lyrics were written by Cynthia Weil of the Brill Building, and she may have had more than one theme in mind.