Why from Somewhere Nowhere by HUNDREDTH

A big goal on this album was making it enjoyable when ‘passively listening’, but have enough sonic depth and emotion to have another experience while ‘actively listening’, in headphones or whatever. If any track on the album captures that, I think it’s this one. Instrumentally, this song was born out of frustration. I struggled for a couple days at Panda, feeling like I was writing the same song over and over again. I set out one evening to just make whatever I wanted and stop thinking about “the album”. I went out and got dinner and came back and started a new idea around 8PM. I was chopping up weird noises and doing the tedious work that I normally hate doing in a song, but for some reason I was enjoying it. Next thing I knew it was 4AM. I had been in an 8 hour wormhole and I was absolutely peaking, listening to this instrumental at max volume and I was the happiest I had been in weeks. I was walking around the room super hyped and then I look over and my dog is completely passed out on the couch. I laughed, did some vocal ideas for the next hour or so, then closed everything down and went to bed (after listening in headphones 20 more times on repeat). Lyrically, I was a little intimidated by the instrumental. It felt so epic and I wanted the lyrics to match in a deep, but not corny way. It took me a while to find the right lyrics for this one. I sat on the instrumental for a couple of months before I got it all figured out. Without getting too heady and ~acid guy~, the song is basically an expose (of sorts) of my generation. It’s a question of why things are the way they are. Mental health is rapidly declining, debt is rapidly climbing and our attention spans are rapidly shrinking. I don’t think the answer is simple but I think all of us are trying to figure it out in our own way. Whether we are embracing it or fighting against it. With this track, I really just wanted to make something people could really relate to. Or at least throw it on in the background at a party.

Tracklist

Why

4:27

Lyrics

so where are you today
in your head and too far away
you wanna wait for panic to subside cuz the maximal form is what we like
you wanna slake desire but the feeling isn’t right stealing all that we can to trade for time
wanna know why wanna know why wanna know why we all want to die
getting over the grey takes sublime getting a word into chime takes a dime when a flower falls from the vine
will i be able to pull it up and find
that maybe i don’t know where to go and will i hold to see where it goes
every low seems to follow me, occupied
we are the centerpiece of the things we’re scared to deny we wanna lace our doubt with time until the feeling is right we are the lesser of either side when we choose to divide
we say we wanna love but we never reply we never reply
we never reply
with debt up to our eyes tell us to fly
tell us to fly
tell us to fly
but there’s a ceiling in the sky so nevermind
so nevermind
so nevermind
and we say it’s alright we say give it time yea we’re all fine
yea we’re all fine
but really we just wanna die and we don’t know why yea
we don’t know why yea
we don’t know why yea
we wanna die
we don’t know why

Credits

from Somewhere Nowhere, released October 9, 2020
Produced by Chadwick Johnson
Written by Chadwick Johnson
Mixed by Sam Pura
Mastered by Sam Pura

License