Paper Thin Walls Lyrics

Lyric discussion by egoat711 

Cover art for Paper Thin Walls lyrics by Modest Mouse

To me it sounds like he's talking about dealing with the fame of being in a band. The first four lines are a just about how he's in the public eye by being in the band with everyone judging his music and his image. The "shakin hands/ shakin in their shoes" reminds me of record execs making deals and marketing Modest Mouse's music and being nervous that it will bring a profit. "Laugh hard... to the bank" and the last few lines are all about how he signed with a major label to make money and he's basically mocking other peoples reactions to it. "Its been a long time since you've been around" refers to all the "friends" you have come out of the woodwork once you make it big and the part about not being a fool for people he doesn't know is saying that he's not going to be a fool and turn down the money from a major label because he's afraid of some small minded "indie" kid that he doesn't know calling him a sell out on some message board.

I'm not quite sure about the "half of everyone else" and "showering/ world stinking" part.

The showering/stinking part may just be self-fufilling prophecy saying that if those people calling them sell-outs keep thinking they are sell-outs then they may in fact become sell-outs. Well I guess that may be part of it. Idk