NEW SINGLE OUT NOW: Dumb Enough

⤷ AI Summary: bad taste in men, worse driver.

Genesis

I wrote this song when I found myself attracted to someone who didn’t seem to have the time of day for me—or maybe they were intentionally giving mixed signals. Who’s to say? Does it really matter? Calculated or not, I was drawn to the void of his attention. The very thing keeping me hooked was the feeling of not being good enough (and he was rly tall)

That night, I thought we had been flirting. super sexy super compatible mmm I'm so charming and scrumptious. But as I was heading out to leave -- "dragging my feet" trying to get his attention before I officially left-- he didn't bother to say goodbye. he didn’t even seem to notice I was gone. Rather, another woman approached him, and they began mingling away. Cue me, walking out like a cuck. I'm so stupid!

Why are you singing about cars tho?

Embarrassed, I got in my car and started driving home through downtown—down the wrong way of a one-way street. A cop lit up his siren and honked at me, and a homeless man screamed at my window, “You’re going the wrong way, lady! You’re going the wrong way!!”

Stressed and humiliated, I headed home feeling even more like an idiot. I turned on my voice memo app to talk-sing to myself. That’s how a lot of my songs start: pulling words from the ether, recording them, and later sifting through the rubbish to find phrases, expressions, or melodies that stick.

The memo was about ten minutes long, most of it unusable and super cringe. But one recurring theme felt loaded and expandable: dumb. Dumb for ignoring the obvious. Dumb for driving (literally and metaphorically) in the wrong direction.

That late-night mishap became the bridge of the song:

Driving the wrong way down a one way,

So I can be right to say I feel dumb

A real-life accident and the perfect metaphor. Choosing a path leading nowhere to confirm the internal beliefs: I pick bad men, and I'm so stupid!

Driving the wrong way down a one way, It would be too simple just to get home…

Here, home represents permanent partnership: marriage, long-term coupling, etc. For me at 23, that felt boring. That’s how it worked out for my sister, but not for me. I don’t want to settle down! I want to float! To fuck around and find out! To be unstable!

Can you show us the evolution???

I changed verse 2, tho now I think it actually reads pretty good! I bet I thought it was clunky. You can't use too many words if you're speaking completely in metaphor as I am here. Current verse 2:

Most exciting is the space between. Addicted to pining, I don’t want to know I can breathe. So I’ll make a floor out of my ceiling, God forbid I pay the entry fee.

Original verse 2:

Most exciting is the space between Addicted to pining, I don’t want to know I can breathe. So I’ll use my ceiling as a floor, God forbid I pay the entry fee. When it all goes quiet, I have half a mind to leave.

The ceiling is the challenge, the unattainable. If I make that my baseline, the floor, then I’ll always reach for what can’t work, meaning I’ll never have to pay the “entry fee," the emotional cost of being in a relationship. Vulnerability. Emotional liability. Risk. I avoid intimacy by chasing impossibility.

The line, “when it all goes quiet, I have half a mind to leave,” is an ode to typical self-sabotage. When things are going well or too simple or too easy, I feel bored. I want out. Cue my next song: Unrest.

What about the sound?

The final sound of this record ended up very rock—which surprises me! Writing and rehearsing the song, I actually had no clue how I wanted it to sound or that it would turn into a huge rock ballad.

What’s funny is that, at the time of writing, I was adamant that I didn’t like rock. Someone pointed out that a lot of my favorite stuff was actually rooted in the genre. I fought back but eventually became unapologetically enthralled with indie-rock, namely Madison Cunningham, whose heavier production influenced the incorporation of more electric guitar, more distortion, more power!

L I S T E N H E R E

Lyrics

On my way out, dragging my feet

I think he forgot to say goodbye to me

There’s no shortage, but I don’t like easy

I like to be stumbling and scraping my knees

I don’t wanna be in any club

dumb enough to have me

Most exciting is the space between

Addicted to pining, I don’t want to know I can breath

So I’ll make a floor out of my ceiling

God forbid I pay the entry fee

I don’t wanna be in any club

dumb enough to have me

Driving the wrong way down a one way

So I can be right to say I feel dumb

Driving the wrong way down a one way

It’d be too simple just to get home

I don’t wanna be in any club

dumb enough to have me

I don’t wanna be with anyone

dumb enough to have me

If you found this to be an interesting read, go check out my other releases!

→ Get with Me

→ Irrelevant

→ You Poor Thing