Jawbreaker – “Indictment” (live)

This song is immediately set apart from the mass of other songs by this band, not to mention the world, by one thing; it is self-conscious. Witness the first line “I just wrote the dumbest song.” I immediately presume that THIS is the song just authored.

I wanted to showcase the live performance of this song from the May 18, 1996 show that begins with “So, see, you might want to hear a story, but instead we’re just going to rock.” Instead, this version from March 10, 1994 begins with members of the crowd yelling all sorts of obscenities, threats, and requests. Blake steps in to calm them, with “Hey – what’s the matter – take it easy.”

The thought from this song is that the band is an accessory to the songs and the songs are all you have in the end. For a band synonymous with personal, journal-entry-turned-lyric songs, this is the antithesis of that.

Of course, there’s more than that happening. The band is writing a song about signing to a major label, which the band then did. (It was originally titled “Scathing Indictment of the Pop Industry.”) Jawbreaker recognizes that they are separated, yet inseparable from their songs. The 1994 performance compliments the former position, while the 1996 performance compliments the latter. Or maybe it’s the other way around. In any event it will have me coming back for more interpretation, and thus more enjoyable listening!

Jawbreaker - "Indictment" (live March 10,1994)

Jawbreaker - (the rest of this show)

Indictment
Studio version appears on the LP "24 Hour Revenge Therapy"

I just wrote the dumbest song.
It's gonna be a sing along.
All our friends will clap and sing.
Our enemies will laugh and be pointing.

It won't bother me,
what the thoughtless are thinking.
I am more concerned
with what we're drinking.
They'll laugh about it at the warehouse,
saying I'm so lame.
It wrote itself,
you can keep the blame.

It'll be a happy song,
not unlike some other ones.
While everyone's depressed and broke,
I get high off your sick jokes. (Ha, ha, ha.)

They're colossal.
They're tousling
all the worried hair.
Stay up there.
So crazy it just might work.
Then we'll quit our jobs.
We could be
the next group that you rob.

There are times for being dumb.
This must be one of them.
I'd like to know what's so wrong,
with a stupid happy song?

It says many things
in its nothingness.
It gives me space to think, I guess.
To think less. And less. And less. And less.
Moving units and tracking charts.
Will they ever learn?
It isn't who you know,
it's who you burn.

It means nothing. Selling kids to other kids.
If you think we changed our tune, I hope we did.