How Not To Leave Town - Story Behind The Song
My Stockholm for this city’s lost
Just missed the train and don’t belong
The boys of summer ripped us off
And stole my namesake for their cause
One score and four can’t set you free
A pawn in my own slavery
Millennials can’t fucking sleep
Those bastards left and took the keys
Yeah my money’s on those punks to win
Yeah don’t hedge that bet on me again
I wrote this song in 5 minutes after being sent yet another rejection letter for a job I was applying for in Nashville, TN. Once again, overqualified. Once again, underpaid. No phone call, no real response, just some generic email sent by the company because their recruiting software filtered me out for a random reason. I guess that’s life nowadays. No human response. Being thrown on the backburner. Just hoping that you can live up the the ridiculous standards of recruiters that 90% of their own employers don’t meet. So it goes. The song is mainly about desperately trying to escape a situation that you no longer want to be in. In this instance, the situation would be living with my parents in Springfield, IL. Springfield is known to many locals as being the “black hole of the Midwest.” People get stuck here due to the low living costs, easygoing way of life and the fact that nothing changes. To me, living in Springfield symbolizes the safe alternative to actually putting yourself out there in the world and trying to pursue something greater than what they are comfortable with.
I somehow became stuck here. Never thought I would.
Imagine going from Australia in the summer to Illinois in the winter. Overnight. Seasonal depression, real depression. Doesn’t matter. It all feels the same. It was during this time period where certain songs became unlistenable to me because of the nostalgic memories they brought up of my life before going to Australia. A few examples would be “Pictures of You” by The Cure, “Feel The Pain” by Dinosaur Jr., and “Our Plague” by Nothing. For some reason, I thought that living in Australia would change everything, but in reality it didn’t. Life in the U.S. had seemingly passed me by.
It was ok for a while after I got over the initial shock. Granted, it took a while to get over the initial shock.
The most vivid experience I had of the return to the U.S. took place the weekend I had come back. I believe that I arrived home on Thursday morning. From there, I slept, but not nearly enough to have been fully recovered from jet lag. I was so eager to see my college friends that I had decided that it would be a good idea to go to St. Louis, and stay at my old apartment and party with my old roommate John.
The weekend was absolutely a blast until Saturday night. That night, I had way too many drinks and got into a depressed state of mind. I then thought it would be a good idea to rally, which essentially means drinking more alcohol to somehow alter my mood into a more positive state.
That lead to me meeting back up with John at the Library Annex (I was back at the apartment when I decided to rally), devouring more shots at the bar, getting more sad/angry, nearly getting in a fight with a bouncer, and then passing out on the apartment couch at 3 in the morning with hardly any recollection of what had happened the night before.
The next morning, I decided to leave for Springfield before John ended up going to church, which was at around 9 a.m. St. Louis is about 90 miles away from Springfield, so the drive isn’t too painful. However, this time was the exception.
The first half an hour seemed fine, but then after that, I noticed something started happening inside my head. Maybe it was the effect of listening to some of the “unlistenable” songs in my life at the time. Songs that I love to the very core of my being, but had an immense emotional impact on me at the time because of the nature of their content. “Pictures of You” by The Cure, “Feel The Pain” by Dinosaur Jr., “Head In The Ceiling Fan” by Title Fight, but I started feeling sad, tired, and frankly drunk all at once.
Exhaustion set in and my mind couldn’t focus. It was nothing short of terrifying. I went through lapses on multiple miles and minutes at a time when I couldn’t remember what had happened a few moments ago. I should have pulled over but didn’t. Pulling over didn’t register with me.
When I got home safely - lucky I did - the last thing I remembered about the drive was being 50 miles outside of Springfield. I had no idea how I ended up in my driveway.
I vaguely remember walking into my house. My dad had mentioned something about a tee time at the course. Were we planning on going golfing? I don’t remember talking about that. My mom mentioned something about clean laundry.
Food. I need food. I was hungry.
I need to text John to tell him...what was I supposed to tell him?
The house felt cold. I remember grabbing my blanket. My mom’s lips were moving as she was staring at me.
“Did you say something?”
“Kirk are you ok?”
“Yeah just give me one…”
The next thing I remember was waking up on the ground. I had passed out. Pure exhaustion had gotten the best of me to the point where my legs and brain had temporarily given up on consciousness.
Turns out that my dad and I were actually planning on going golfing. Those plans were quickly scrapped along with any other plans that I may have had. I slept the rest of the day. I remember getting up to my bedroom and thinking that it had been a rough start to returning back home, and that it should get better. I was right, but I had no idea at that time how long “getting better” would take.
Right before falling asleep for 12 hours straight, I felt my phone vibrate. I had gotten a text from
John:“Dude, relax. You’ll be alright. Just get some sleep. It has been a long weekend for both of us. You’re just jetlagged.”
What did I say? I scrolled up to see what I had said to get that response.
Turns out that I sent John two messages. The first was thanking him for the great weekend and telling him that I had gotten home safely. The second one was a text that would have put anyone on edge.
“I think I’m having a mental breakdown.”
Scary. But true.
“You’re just jetlagged…”
I now wish that his diagnosis would have been that simple.
I initially got a job at retail store called Scheels working part time. Didn’t like it, but at least it gave me something to do. I still had friends in town from high school and made new friends along the way. I got promoted to a manager position and full time around 3 months after starting at Scheels. I took the job because I needed money, but I quickly started resenting the store. With that came resentment with my living situation. I just started becoming disillusioned by the cards I had been dealt - the stillness of retail while living in Springfield, pestering people to buy things that they don’t need. It made me feel like I was regressing drastically from where I wanted to be post-graduation. I certainly wasn’t moving towards wherever that was.
Photo By Jackson P - https://www.tripadvisor.com/Attraction_Review-g60887-d5105490-Reviews-Scheels-Springfield_Illinois.html#/media-atf/5105490/351602003:p/?albumid=-160&type=0&category=-160
We have all had those 9-5 jobs where it feels like the life is slowly being sucked out of our soul. It seems like working becomes a survival tactic to make ends meet. That’s how it felt during the summer of 2017.
I worked a job at Scheels that I hated for a year of my life that I can’t get back. I wasn’t doing much outside of playing guitar or drums every now and then. That and drinking way too much trying to numb the disappointment within myself. Just slowly biting time. My job wasn’t getting any better with time, either. Good ole retail. I was an overqualified salesperson that didn’t buy into groupthink like a lot of my coworkers did. When working in a bureaucratic organization like a retail store, independent thinking is either seen as a threat or insubordination by your peers or managers.
One day, I was in a leadership training class and publicly brought up concerns that I had involving the company’s training process. Later that week, I was asked by multiple coworkers if anything had come of the incident because it turns out that the store manager was unhappy with me “publicly” voicing my concerns. I was scolded by my boss the next day. I mentally checked out after this incident. I had already decided that I was going to quit the job before the incident, but this just made me care a lot less. Before then, I would have at least given suggestions or insights that I think would have helped the store. After that I just stayed in line and checked off the boxes that it took to not get me fired. Minimal effort. No fucks given. I was just there for the paycheck. Coasting. Not caring. Not taking initiative. Just a rules-follower who “bought into” the organization by being told to “stay the fuck down.” The irony is that things got easier for me when taking this approach. I stayed in line, did my job, and stayed care free.
More time wasted...
I had planned on quitting for a while, but found myself holding off because I wanted to stick around past Christmas to get my massive commission check. I was in charge of women’s outerwear (AKA selling women winter coats) of all things, and about one third of my pay was commission based. When December rolled around, I would still earn my normal base pay, but as expected, my commission check was about five times what it normally was. It would have been careless to leave before receiving the commission money. Still, busy retail is also five times more annoying than non-busy retail. I was constantly getting paid to listen to customers complain about prices, our dwindling inventory, and their miniscule problems in Podunk, Illinois. Basically instead of a salesperson, I turned into a counselor for a month whose pay was $10/hr plus commission. Anything for an extra buck, right?
Photo by Little Mountain 5 - https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Scheels_Ferris_Wheel.jpg
Finally, I had to put an end to it. Working as a retail salesperson at Scheels, I was lectured that “the work isn’t done when Christmas comes and goes. The time after Christmas is most important because you can “capitalize on selling items that other stores have run out of.”
I’m sure that every retail employee has heard the above spiel at least once. Therefore, every retail employee knows the reality of the mantra:
It’s wrong. It’s a lie. It’s a fallacy to try to get employees - like me - to turn the page - to not mentally check out - to not leave the organization. Following my employment at Scheels, I was told that employees most commonly quit a retail job right after the holiday season. Not sure if there are stats to back this up, but it certainly seems like a valid statement.
The store might have been busy for 3 days after Christmas. This period of time is known in retail as the “season of returned items.” After that, the store is dead. It turns into a desert. My bosses were told by their bosses to make sure that we were staying proactive during this time, but there was nothing to do.
I was always told to stop talking to my coworkers or to get paperwork done when our orders had already been placed and there would only be one customer on the floor that I had talked to 5 times.
I had reached a boiling point on December 26th.
I had to work the day after Christmas. What a joke. That was the day I decided to put in my two weeks notice.
Merry fucking Christmas.
I remember waking up and sleeping in too much from the alcohol that I had consumed the previous night - Christmas night. The Baileys dessert martinis and Woodford Reserve fully endorsing my holiday spirit. I was in a rush because I had been made a “leadership concern” for my lack of punctuality. The funny thing is that I was only actually late once. By 20 minutes. So, I have no arguments involving that incident. The problem was that Scheels implements an employee code known as “Scheels time”. In the employment contract, there is a clause that states that employees are expected to show up 10 minutes before a shift. If you don’t, you’re considered late. I would usually show up 5 minutes before a shift, but still get down to the sales floor on time, which is why the rule was implemented. My manager was pressured by her boss into making me a “leadership concern” for not following this elementary rule. Bullshit business rule No. 1: Common sense never prevails in bureaucracy...a more realistic statement would be “Common sense is shot twice, stabbed, and bludgeoned to death within the reign of bureaucracy.”
On a related note, I was secretly proud of my Scheels demerits. It’s comparable to the dream scenario of returning to high school once you have already been in college. Wouldn’t you happily get sent to the principal's office for calling out faulty processes, teachings, and general impracticality on a daily basis?
Anyway, I was running late on the 26th and needed to find a white undershirt that I would wear under my uniform dress shirt (I was also previously given demerits for having wrinkles in my work shirt as well as not being clean shaven). I grabbed the last clean white shirt in my dresser, threw it on and then examined myself in the mirror to make sure that the shirt wasn’t too wrinkled (another thing I had been “written up” for at work).
It wasn’t just a plain white undershirt.
Across the front in silver font, read, “Nine Inch Nails: The Downward Spiral.”
One of the greatest records of all time. One of the records that made me want to become a musician. One of the most influential bands in rock history. A band whose business marketing models have redefined the music business landscape over the past decade.
I stood there, still trapped in the moment, reflecting on what the record, the band, and music has meant to me. The emotion, passion and joy it brought into my life. How I promised myself that I would be on to bigger and better things at this point, 24 years old. I mean, Christ, Kurt Cobain had just about written the songs to Nevermind by 24 years old. Only a few months later in his life, he would be a multi millionaire in the most successful band on the planet.
There I was, a hungover, broke college graduate living with my parents, depressed the day after Christmas, dreading going to work because I hated my job. I was overqualified for my job anyway, how did I get suckered into working the day after Christmas?
Time to leave this place. No more waiting. You’re ready. So, like Clark Kent, wearing his suit, tie, and glasses, I put on my blue Scheels button down shirt, temporarily changed my persona to “upbeat retail worker” who wouldn’t want to be anywhere else but selling you things that you don’t need the day after Christmas, and went to work, bearing the burden of knowing that my true persona lay just below the surface.
When I got to work, I sat at my desk at Scheels and looked at the calendar. I wanted to stick around until after the local college students left town for their out of state schools - just in case there were some extra sales to be made. After scanning dates, I circled Friday, January 13th.
On January 2nd, I put in my two weeks notice.
After I left Scheels, I took some planned time off to travel and gather my thoughts. I quickly got bored, nervous about not having a huge financial security blanket, and dove into the job search. I thought it would be an easy transition of finding new footing once I made the risky decision of quitting my job. However, after about 2 months of applying for jobs, I hit a wall of not hearing back from any employers. My job search quickly turned into a deserted wasteland of ignored emails and generic rejection letters. I started going stir crazy sitting in my house while my friends got promotions for great companies, doctorate degrees, and moved to places where they actually wanted to be. It was grueling having them visit me in Springfield. Things would be like the old times for a few days. We would hang out, play video games, drink, tell the same stories, then they would leave and get on with their new, beautiful life that they had created for themselves (the boys of summer ripped us off). So there I was, twenty-four years old (One score and four), college degree, unemployed and living with my parents. I was so disappointed in myself and would not let myself hear the end of it. Beating myself up day by day, hour by hour. There were nights when I couldn’t sleep because it seemed like I subconsciously wanted to punish myself with sleep deprivation the next day. Some would consider this a self-destructive process, but contentedness is just a precursor to sloth, right?
Not being able to escape the situation I was in, while desperately and proactively trying, I became bitter. Maybe there was nowhere else for me to go. I should have gotten a job right out of college when I was actually marketable. Never should have gone to Australia. Now the most recent and substantial professional experience I had on my resume was something that I hated doing.
“How Not To Leave Town” basically refers to the grind of that time. Losing job offers to kids who would happily work 60 hours for a $35,000 paycheck (Millennials can’t fucking sleep; My money’s on those punks to win). Getting interviews and never hearing back. Constantly being reminded “Yeah, you’re a bright kid. Something will come up eventually,” (Don’t hedge that bet on me again). Reminds me of the the lyrics to “Cosmic Hero” by Car Seat Headrest: “‘It’ll be alright. It’ll be alright. It’ll be alright.’ ‘Fuck you!’.”
Fuck it. Consider this song my final plea. My swan song. The final realization that there is more out there and I’m going to find it. I’m leaving soon. The clock is counting down. My Stockholm syndrome for this city is lost.
Music Video
Filming the HNTLT music videos is truly one of the most memorable experiences of my life. I had very specific shots in mind with that were previously discussed with Karissa, who was going to filming the main footage. The idea was spawned during Thanksgiving 2020 when Karissa’s brother Isaac, lit colored smoke bombs outside in order to celebrate the holiday. The smoke was mesmerizing, and I immediately knew that there was a music video to me made.
Flash forward a few months, and I have acquired about 30 military grade smoke bombs, and bags of fireworks. The idea for the music video has grown into more of a yin yang aesthetic where there would be epic day shots utilizing smoke bombs and night shots would utilize fireworks.
We lucked out as Karissa’s parents were kind enough to let us use their gorgeous plot of land in order to get the beautiful outdoor look that we were going for .
The day of filming, we had encountered a problem. There had been a massive storm the night before that shut down the majority of the roadways that led out to Karissa’s parents’ house. Roads were flooded. Roads were falling apart. After going an hour out of our way to explore every option, we had found a back rpad that allowed us to climb out of the river valley, get away from the flooding, and get to Karissa’s parents’ house.
Matt, Karissa, and I arrived at around 2 or 3 in the afternoon and started filming immediately after quickly setting up our instruments. The initial shot was everything I had hoped for as we had set up 3 smoke bombs and filmed Matt and I playing through the 1st verse of the song. The shots were absolutely stunning. I personally was in awe while the shot was happening as it was apparent that the epic nature of the shots had gone beyond everyone’s expectations.
After getting 2 shots of the 1st verse (static and dynamic), the process of filming the performance shots of the music video became a story of rinse and repeat.
For the vocal performances, I wanted a “dreamy” feel because of the resolving feel of the melody. Therefore, we filmed Matt lip synching the song in double time (HNTLT sounds hilarious in double time), we filmed in 60 frames per second, and then we cut the speed of the shots in half when editing the video. The end product was a stunning visual the captured the vibe of the song perfectly.
After getting the 1st verse shots done, we had to address the intro the the song.
I had always visualized an eerie aesthetic involving a WW1 gas mask because it fit the look of the natural setting and smoke bombs. Like a war zone. Karissa’s brother had mentioned that he had a gas mask laying around that was perviously used as a movie prop. It worked perfectly.
After tying the rings of 2 red smoke bombs to my 2 opposite wrists using Paracord, we were ready to film the opening shot of the music video. The idea was to have an attention-grabbing opening shot. I’d say mission accomplished.
After getting the day shots, we took a break in order to let the sun go down and in order to get some food because the 4 of us (including Isaac) were famished.
After the sun went down, we knew that the filming process would be the same but with sparklers and fountains rather than smoke bombs. The biggest obstacle was the lack of light, but flashlights and car headlights definitely helped with that problem. Similarly to the smoke bomb shots, the night shots with fireworks exceeded all expectations:
Outside of Matt nearly getting pelted with sparks from a fountain firework (2:45 in music video), the filming was an absolute success. Admittedly, we didn’t get packed up and ready to go until midnight that night, but there were no regrets as we all knew that we had created an incredible work of art.
