lifeblood: socs: 1995-04-12: chickenman (convocation center, ohio university - athens, ohio)

chickenman (16:19) (listen)

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amy ray starting at the x:xx mark:

i wrote this song when i was thinking about all these spare parts you see lying in the middle of the road. i've been obsessed with dying ever since i can remember. realizing that i was existing for a short ammount of time.. so when i decided to make traveling my way of life i was suprised. cause when you're moving all the time you tend to run into things... alot. you see a lot of things that other people are running into alot, which is a very...interisting thing to see. so this song kind of takes place-and were going to start from georgia take this tour, and were gonna go up the eastern seaboard get up into canada somewhere. and were driving this big maroon ford van. and were gonna go from georgia and pass through all the southern states and end up somewhere in the middle of texas...texas is sort of a wierd place, you know? cause it's sort of the bastion of everything i've never believed in...yeah there's these little bits of enlightenment just hanging around for no reason. it's really incredible because if you open your mind up to it, it's a really cool place. so here we are, were sitting in houston were going to play at this place and it's um, this bar and were real small, real small. and were playing at this bar that's about half the size of this stage maybe. and were going to sleep that night at this guy's house it's kinda like this..brothel, sorta. and it's getting harder and harder as this is going on. i'm thinking ablut all these things. i was thinking anout this woman i saw when i was running down the street in toronto and she was beat up by a bunch of people and she was left layin' there and i walked right by her...walked right by...walked right by. movin'. gotta be somewhere i gotta get somewhere, guys. i was running, you know, i gotta time my mile. i can't stop. i can't stop. so i 'm thinking about this, thinking about this. i was thinking about- i was in the middle of the desert this one time and this family of prarie dogs was crossing the road and i thought "aww shit" 'cause i couldn't slow down cause i was goin so fast. and i just hit every single one of them. i thought, "this is unbelievable!" i mean, how could i? the law of probability was totally against me. they were runnin' as fast as they could and -just- five!! one, two three, boom!! oh god, seriuos karma trouble. so i'm in this car and i'm thinking about all these things. and were driving and were driving and were driving and it;s kinda like, you cover your eyes when you see something that's lying in the road and you go "oh it's just a bag- a dead bag okay, that's cool, i can handle that." and you see something else and it's like a tire. okay, no problem, so you open your eyes cause you figure everything is going to be this inanimate object and it's no big deal. and then all of a sudden you're standing in front of this dog with it's guts hanging out and you think "aww shit!" and you wanna close your eyes, close your eyes. these are the things you think about, these are the things i think about. and these are the things that are obsessing, obsessing. were counting all these things and putting numbers on everything.
okay, so moving on, moving on. okay, so we go to this flea market cause i'm thinking at least theres one thing in the world that's gonna lift your spirits when you have 10 dollars in your pockets and you go to a flea market and buy something. i know it's material it's very material but it's true. i mean you can be as spiritual as anybody in the whole world and you're still gonna feel that way, i don't care what you say. so we go in this flea market and it's cool, it's cool. and we come outta that an we go, and we see next door and we see this big field layed out with all these tables and there's stuff everywhere. there's stuff all over these tables -it's like this endless, endless tables! and i'm like, "this is amazing! this yard sale on the side of the highway! i can't believe it this is so great!!" and i'm looking through all this stuff,i'm thumbing through books, looking at the cameras and the binoculars and the old motorcycle parts and bicycles and hopefully the stratocasters(sp?) that are layin' in somebody's attic that i'm gonna buy for five dollars. and i'm thinking about all this stuff and i'm thinking, okay, okay. so this man walks out of this trailer and i look over and i see him and i'm like (awed whisper) "wow!... look at this guy! he is really cool looking!!" it just strikes me right in the heart. he's got this really cool long hair and it's matted and tangled and it's got bugs and dirt and all this shit is all in his hair and he's really cool! and he's wearing these old clothes and i'm thinking, "i am so middle class i am so middle class i am so middle class!" i'm looking at this guy and i'm thinking, "how can i relate? i can't relate! i gotta relate! i gotta relate!" cause this is someone i'm supposed to meet my whole life! so, i'm gonna meet this guy and i'm gonna talk to him and it's gonna be really great. and i'm thinking, what can i say? okay, what i'm going to say is...i'm going to buy something and he's going to be really happy and this is really condisending, i'm thinking, this is really arrogant, you know? i'm gonna buy something from him and he's gonna appreciate me so much that he's gonna want to talk to me. how materialistic can you get? what an asshole i am. so, i'm thinking this- i'm gonna do it anyway, i don't care. so i pick up this book and say, "how much is this book?" and he says, "that's not for sale." i think, "oh, great." so i pick up something else and i hand him that and i say, "how much is this?" and says, "that's not for sale either." and i say,"well, what is for sale? what can i buy? i mean all this stuff, i mean, i really want to buy something today, you know, burnin' a hole in my pocket." and he says, "you can't buy anything, you're standing in my front yard." oh, great! i feel like a complete jerk now. i'm trespassing. i'm rude. i'm a white middle class american girl. yeah (chuckle) and i've offended this man, too. and i'm thinking, how can i make it up to him? i've got these things inside my soul that i've never told anyone and i'm gonna tell this guy. i'm gonna make this connection. so, i'm thinking all these things that i'm gonna ask him and tell him. what do i want to say? okay, so we're standing in the middle of this field and were looking up into the sky-and did you ever think about what's come before you, and what's coming after you? and that's no big deal, that's no big deal. what i want to say is, i present myself as this peaceful person all my life and what i really want to do is run down the street with a machine gun and shoot all these assholes that are getting in my way! and when i'm driving down the road and i see some guy with a bumper sticker and it says something i don't believe in, what i really want to do-i mean i try to be understanding-but what i really want to do is go faster and faster and ram into the back of his car!!!!! and do you ever think about the animals you see laying in the middle of the road that some jerk runs over without even thinking about it-and their guts are hanging out! and they're howling and they're barking and they're kicking and they're scratching, because you were going 85 miles an hour when you should have been going 55!!!!!!!! and you feel bad because what you want to do is slow down...slow down. and what i want to do is i wanna go faster! i wanna go faster! i wanna have sex in the middle of nowhere!!! ( next line indecipherable due to crowd cheers) i want to be the worst person i could ever be in my whole life. and i want to be black. i want to be red, i want to be yellow!!!!!! but i just walk away because it's too much.
i was on the road to austin...