Out of Site

When it comes to Nature vs. Nurture, I've always felt that Nurture holds more weight, and I feel this song kinda goes along with that idea. The first passage is key-

"Raised unright So uptight But why blame you You wouldn't be if you could choose"

I use thinking like this to not blame people for ignorant, stuck up behavior.

am i the only one who likes this song?

I do, it's one of my favourite Built to Spill songs.

best song on the album.

"out of site" is probably the best song on "perfect from now on" - but "perfect from now on" is the best bts album. anybody else think so?

Definitely, their best album so far.

I actually prefer Keep It Like a Secret but there is no denying Perfect From Now On has no equal in Built To Spill's catalog. For me, it does not get as much play time as Keep It Like a Secret or There's Nothing Wrong With Love but in terms of the sheer elegance and texture and beauty of the instrumentation and just the album in general, I would say it's their most impressive "achievement".

I think the fact that the initial recordings burned up in the back of Phil Elk's car and caused them to have to re-record all those guitar parts was actually beneficial to the albums sound (all that painstaking work aside) as it just allowed for another facet of the musicality to unfold; in other words, having to rerecord meant they had another chance to do it all over again, just with the added knowledge and experience of having done all of it already before. I cannot say if the guitars sound the way they do as a direct result of the first set of tapes igniting into flame but there is something so entrancing about the guitar on this album; like a deeply complex myriad of overlapping sound and the texture of those sounds coalescing together. Maybe it sounded just as it does now on the first go around but there seems to be something timeless about the instrumentation on this album that I think may have come about as a result of all that guitar playing and all the hours devoted to recording the guitars that it just culminated onto/into eight songs in such a perfect way; a PERFECT way.

perfect from now on = perfect.

zen Buddhism

My favorite song from the album as well.

I think Uncle Bengi and I have the same interpretation. The opening verses point to someone whose experiences have caused them to be the person they are. The final line makes me wonder if the song is concluding that people don't really change.

"It goes on and on and on and on and on and on and on and on and on and on and on and on and on..."

Will the subject of the song who "brings people down" ever stop doing so? And if so, can we really blame them?