My Gen X Playlist: August and Everything After – The Counting Crows

Daily writing prompt

What bothers you and why?

It’s not fun, but I can admit my flaws. I can be an impatient person and like being efficient with time. Waiting unnecessarily tends to bother me. I think this stems from a career of juggling multiple projects and managing time. Always too many balls in the air and not wanting any of them to drop. Interesting enough, what bothers me even more is that I am this way. So, in a sense, it’s a double whammy. This is something that I’ve been working on yet still not over the hump. I should relax and let life play out instead of constantly rushing it. Otherwise, I’m just creating unnecessary stress and making life more complicated than it needs to be.

So, thank goodness for music. Music has always had a calming effect on me. Vocals, lyrics and melody. Sometimes it’s just one, other times, it’s a blend of all three. One song I discovered a few years ago was the Counting Crows’ August and Everything Afterwards. This was the title of one of my favorite Counting Crows’ albums back in 1993. The surprising thing, though, at that time, the song was incomplete and never made it on the album, despite the song’s handwritten lyrics on the cover art. This always had been somewhat of a mystery to me. Almost twenty five years later, Adam Duritz completed the song and recorded it with the London Studio Orchestra. Outside a lyric or two that may be a little discomforting, it’s a beautiful arrangement and recording. Here is another version that includes Duritz discusses the background. It’s pretty interesting listening to the story behind the recording.

“It’s not a story about my life, but it’s a story about how I feel about life. You don’t really walk along the edge of the ocean, like it’s a tightrope. It’s a metaphor about how you feel about something”.

– Adam Duritz

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For a complete playlist, please click here.

For the Spotify playlist, please click here.

They're waking up Maria
'Cause everybody else has got someplace to go
She makes a little motion with her head
Rolls over, and says she's gonna sleep
For a couple minutes more
I said I'm sorry to Maria
For the cold-hearted thing that I have done
I've said I'm sorry by now, at least once
To just about everyone
She says, "I have forgotten what I'm supposed to do today"
And it slips my mind what I'm supposed to say
We're getting older and older and older and older
And always a little further out of the way
You look into her eyes
And it's more than your heart will allow
In August and everything after
You get a little less than you expected somehow

Well, I stumbled into Washington Square
Just as the sun began to rise
And I walked across the lawn to the cathedral
And I lay down in the shadow of St. Mary's in the sky
I'm just one of these late model children
Waiting for the king
But there ain't no sign of Elvis in San Francisco
It's just me and I'm playing this rock and roll thing
She wants to be just like me
And I want every damn thing that I can see
You know, one day you're Daddy's little angel
The next day, you're everything he wanted you to be

They dress you up in white satin
And they give you your very own pair of wings
In August and everything after
I'm after everything

Well, I got my reservations
And I got my seven-million dollar home
I got the number of some girl in North Dakota
Who's always wide awake
So I never have to spend the night alone
I got this nasty little habit
Of peeking down the shirts of all the little girls
As they pass me by
And I know you wonder when it all catches up to me
And they finally bring me down
Do you think I'm gonna cry?
Well listen, I already got my disease
So get your fucking filthy hands off of me
I hope you weren't expecting me to be crucified
The best that they can do
Is just to hang me from the nearest tree

It's midnight in San Francisco
And I'm waiting here for Jesus on my knees
In August and everything after
I need somebody else to bleed for me

In August and everything after
I need somebody else to bleed for me

Well, I came down from San Francisco
Because I had confidence and a military mind
But now everyone I know is turning showgirl
And dancing with their shirt off
In some Las Vegas hotel line
So I'm going to New York City
Cause it got a little sleazy here for me
And when I find myself alone
You know I'm never going home
You make the changes
The changes that you need
But I no longer know how to pray
I live in a dog town and it's a Dalmatian parade
I change my spots over and over
But they never seem to fade away

I am the last remaining Indian
Looking for the place where the buffalo roam
In August and everything after
Man, them buffalo ain't never coming home

In August and everything after
Man, them buffalo ain't
They ain't never coming home
No

In August and everything after
Man, them buffalo ain't never coming home