Behind The Lyrics: Forth With The Herd
Quick update before the article: Jordan just finished up drums for the new album in studio, and we’re going to have video footage of that in the next few days.
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Hi! Eric here. This is another post in our series about the meanings behind the song lyrics.
This time I’m covering ‘Forth With The Herd’:
I wrote these lyrics when I was in university. At the time, I was working hard on some sound production courses through which I was learning how to engineer and edit. In fact, all of our 2008 EP Carry The Flame, as well as the guitar tracking for Unspoken Words were done through those classes, which was great. (And I met Max there, which turned out for the best, haha.)
What wasn’t so great was the mentality that I was surrounded with at the time. Perhaps it was the age group, or the class/culture (upper middle-suburban-white) many of my fellow students came from, but I felt like at lot of them had no idea why they were studying. Their parents had pushed them into it and were paying for it, so these kids just went along, sucking the teat, and assuming they would get a six-figure job at the end of a communications degree… ha! These people are part of what I call “The Seasame Street Generation”, people who were told they could be whatever they wanted to be, so they just go along with the flow without any plan, but still expect to be rich/famous/world leaders/etc.
The other part that was bothering me was the corporate business aspect of higher education. Call me naïve, but I only realized a few years in that universities really just are businesses. They need corporate sponsorships. They need good PR. That means hypocritical things like publishing a Dean’s list in the newspaper and setting up booths by organizations like the military or credit card companies to try and rope students in. There are many sides to this issue, I know that, but it still bothers me fundamentally.
In the end, I’m not saying “fuck higher education”, in fact quite the opposite, I’m saying that there should be more of it and that it should be of better quality. I just don’t think school should ever be used as a substitute for the real world. If you don’t know what the Hell to do with your life, get some kind of job, travel, try things, but for fuck’s sake don’t just go into some program because someone else said it was a good idea. Go when you’re ready and grow up in the meantime.
Forth With The Herd
Welcome to class now you are
Locked up all your life in a concrete structure
Blocked off from the world
Clogging up your thoughts with the empty notions
Null on the outside
Live, learn
A blank stare responds
The master of ceremonies drones right on for hours
The blinding lights go dull
The brilliant babies go back home uninspired
Running up your brain through the rodent mazes
Cold and predefined
Making all the necessary contributions
Keep within the lines
Hold still
Welcome to academic success
Jerk off to your name on the Dean’s List
Slowly marching forth with the herd
The umbilical cord of the world
Choking off the breath of your mind
Hollowed out and starving for life
Recycle the elite pinned to your chest
Leaning to the right while stroking the left
Slowly marching forth with the herd
The umbilical cord of the world
Embryonic brains without spines
A flock of talking heads in disguise
Disappear in a sea of cloned thought patterns
Slowly marching forth with the herd
The umbilical cord of the world
Self-aborted right in your prime
Speak up your idea will inspire and shine
Alas it’s been thought a thousand times
Castrate yourself with the fear of being less than wealthy
Rapid-fire attempts at quick inspiration leave you broke and numb
The paralyzing pain of their expectations causes you to run
Drop out
