You're Not Alone: An Every Time I Die Post That Became Something Else

Every Time I Die: Finding out the Answer is there is no Answer

Typically when someone asks me my favorite… anything really, I tend to be overcome with a bit of anxiety. I mean how do you gauge your favorite anything? It comes and goes with time and feelings, and it depends solely on where you are in your life’s story. But one question, in particular, is easy for me: What is your favorite band?

Every Time I Die.
Period.

Back in oh maybe 2011/2012? That sounds right. I was hit with some crippling depression. I had struggled with it since Jr High, but it was nothing like this. I would skip my classes, lay in my empty apartment on my air mattress graciously offered to me by a coworker. I would do this for days as slipped into a juvinihilist daze in between long sessions of sleep. I would drink alone quite a bit, and it accumulated into one night where I attempted to drink 2 litres of Jameson as fast as I could. If I died, well then I was just some dumb 21 year old who didn’t know his limits. Totally not a suicide. Life was meaningless, society sucked and was so narcissistic and self-involved and distracted. I was in debt both student debt (with no idea what or why I was doing other than it was expected) and credit card debt (because I was too prideful to ask my family for help - not that they would have been able too). To this day I haven’t been able to do much to dig myself out (oh look another unknown number calling me from a state I know no one in…) It is still a struggle. Some days are good some days are bad, but one thing is different. I feel hope, I feel the ability to change and grow. Reflecting back, things seem infinitely better. But I digress…

During this time I would often send drunken rants to my best friend about my feelings and fears. On the good days, we would talk about philosophy. “Listen to Every Time I Die. They sing about the things you are talking about.” He would say. And I did. I had never felt so connected to a band or lyrics or albums in my life.

New Junk Aesthetic was the first album by them I listened to. Filled to the brim with angst, pop culture references, literary references, and philosophy and spiritual references. No album held the top spot on my favorites list as long as that one, and it was only knocked away by Low Teens, their most recent album.

If I was to talk about all their albums, I would possibly win an award for the longest post on Steemit. So for now we are just going to focus on the newest album, Low Teens. Specifically, Keith’s honesty of the darkest time in his life. (If this post gets enough likes or if people are interested, I may start doing a song by song lyric breakdown. Of course with any art there are multiple subjective meanings and interpretations - including the objective reasons why an artist would create it. I also may do it anyways.)

Low Teens on Spotify

Every Time I Die and the lyrics particularly have always been very tongue-in-cheek and metaphoric and playful, but they've never been honest, because that would require me to feel something. I think a lot of my lyrics are sort of a way of denying all this bad stuff was ever happening and I was just joking around with it. But this was very front and center for me. It helped me to write some of the most honest lyrics I've ever done. - Keith Buckley, lead singer and songwriter of ETID. Fuse Interview With Keith Buckley

It doesn’t matter how many times I have listened to ETID, I still feel a swell of emotions and ASMR. Even now typing this with Low Teens on repeat it never loses its potency.

During the time in which he would be writing the lyrics to Low Teens, Keith and his wife had been expecting their first child. It was a complicated pregnancy resulting in many hospital visits.

"Stay with me. You're alone in the center of hell. Just be."
The longest winter I have ever seen
From hospital to hospital. Repeat
Lyrics from Petal

During the birth of his child, both his daughter and wife had to be hooked into life-support machines.

I try to plead with your machines.
I'm at the feet of your machines.
Tell me anything at all.
Lyrics from C++ (Love Will Get You Killed)

During this time Keith had also quit drinking.

When I found alcohol when I was like 16 or 17, I was like, "Holy shit, this is what it's like to have human interaction." It's been that way for 20 years, me drinking in order to interact.

I personally had not had the same experience with alcohol. My use of it when I was younger was to numb myself to the pain I was feeling. I would get so depressed and nihilistic as a result, yet I never realized how much worse it made me. I still drink from time to time. I’ll go out with my friends and have a few, but I will never get drunk. (There have been a few times I have, to be honest…) I can’t lose control, or I will start sounding like Rust Cohle from True Detective. So my drinking has become a rarity now. I definitely am not sober. Around the same time as I discovered them, I had begun smoking weed. Recently I have also used hallucinogens on occasion. Don’t take this as gospel, drug use is a personal choice and I am by no means encouraging you to take drugs to cope, but I will honestly say they have helped me continue my growth, expand my perception, and break down the barriers I have built to prevent myself from feeling things.

I feel like this post has gotten away from me. What was originally intended to be a post about why you should give ETID a chance, has become a bit more honest. Due to our evolution or development in spite of our mortality - which ever you believe in (it is all the same to me) - we are primed to notice when things are going bad. Some of us more than others. If you are struggling, know you aren’t alone. I can’t offer you too much advice. I can’t promise things will get better. But there is always that chance. To have hope. To feel love. No matter how fleeting is worth it. I can’t say that life is meaningful, but I can say you can live a meaningful life. You just have to aim high for the horizon and climb that mountain. If you are struggling, drop by and say hi in the comments. I would love to chat with you, even if I am used as a distraction.

Map Change music video:

And I will leave you with this, the lyrics to Religion of Speed:

I can't continue on without a sign
One wing to haul the weight of only one third of an eye
The voice I'm leaning into has been thrown
When all the meat is stripped away I'm chewing on the bone
I'm condemned until the moment I forget
That I haven't learned a goddamn thing yet
My soul is sticking out like a talon through a shell
You can wait until the rapture I will hightail it to hell
Water everywhere but no water fit to drink
I've got endless proof and I don't know what to think
Nothing but time, not a minute left to spare
Gallons of fuel, I can't get anywhere
When all I am is a stone that says the name I had and the years that I had been,
The quiet depths and the measured steps won't echo like the shriek of riot did
Sever the anchor you drag or be frozen at the stake
Choke down all the prey in your path before you become the prey
No one likes a company man
Nothing but a snake, nothing but a snake
Look at my war it's the prettiest thing alive
I traded it for sanity now all you see is mine
Open the throttle, feel the thunder in the sails
Pick up the scent of fear and follow the trail
When all I am is a stone that says the name I had and the years that I had been
The quiet depths and the measured steps won't echo like the shriek of riot did
I can't move the dredge without heat
Still water of a puddle and the ocean never meet
I've wandered off a path into a storm
A trance into a fury, a mantra for a sword
Doomed until I recall how to fire up an engine that has stalled
I would trade what I have lost for the things that I have left. Some clarity just to see darkness best?
My flower in your barrel hasn't stopped the slaughter yet
So spent, we can't be saved
We lost sleep but we found our way
Sharpen your axe against the road
Don't hold out hope
Such courage pulls us down. We ride on
Such courage pulls us down. We ride on
Our songs refuse a grave
These beating hearts make violent waves
Push the pedal right through the floor
Want so much more
When all I am is a stone that says the name I had and the years that I had been
The quiet depths and the measured steps won't echo like the shriek of riot did

Thank you for taking the time to read this. I appreciate it immensely. I know some people may find these lyrics depressing. Everyone is different, but to me, ETID has the most relatable lyrics of any band or group. I will be bringing some more of their songs and lyric breakdowns and what they speak to me. I hope that people will find it interesting and maybe it will speak to others.

Again, thank you.

Edit: Woah I never expected this kind of blow up from my post! This morning I had 15 votes, I check it during my first break and its above 350!! Thank all of you so much, your support means so much to me. I look forward to helping this community grow. In fact this post has convinced my long time friend mentioned in this post to join up! Hopefully he gets approved soon.. I can't thank you enough. :)