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Songs for Grownups Volume 4

from Songs for Grownups Volume 3 by Jay Ackley

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about

In my earlier days of songwriting and recording I felt like I just wanted to spew my guts out about every little thing that crossed my mind and heart. I feel a lot more ambivalent about what's 'worth sharing' as an artist these days and want to be more intentional about what I put out into the world. Nick Ryan (of The Cold Harts) features on trumpet.

lyrics

I have a complicated emotional relationship
With music I liked when I was younger
You know the kind of song that perfectly encapsulates
That dumb-fuck adolescent hunger
That universally transcendent emotion
Of resenting your ex-girlfriend
Or another lo-fi indie masterpiece
About how it’s really great to do heroin

I wrote a couple of songs that I’m proud of
But I’m not gonna put them on this album
Cuz they’re about real-life stuff, and it’s complicated
And I don’t think it’d be good to share them
Songs I wouldn’t have thought twice about
Hollering out when I was a young one
Maybe if I work up the nerve
I’ll play them next summer for my cousins

I tried writing songs about make-believe situations
Interpersonal betrayals, haunting regrets,
Psychological frustrations
Jen found out I was making stuff up
It seemed like they felt betrayed
I really didn’t like how that felt
I don’t write songs like that these days

I have a complicated emotional relationship
With songs I wrote when I was a kid
I thought plausible deniability would hide
what they were really about, of course that never did
This petulant child performing
Uncomfortably personal emotional undressing
Looking back it’s stupid embarrassing
Like damn that kid was messy

Megan says “life’s messy too!”
That makes it easier to forgive myself
Like maybe somebody was suffering similarly
And hearing those songs it might’ve helped
Either way I don’t think I’m comfortable
Doing that kinda thing anymore
I don’t think there’s ever gonna be
A Songs for Grown-ups Volume Four

credits

from Songs for Grownups Volume 3, released December 1, 2023
Trumpet: Nick Ryan
www.thecoldharts.com

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Jay Ackley Brooklyn, New York

Minnesotan in Brooklyn by way of London; having a sing-song through the dystopia.

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