The first time I listened to this song with my serial-killer-collage-level-crazy ears on, I became obsessed with finding out what significant event had happened in Davey’s life in 1985. So I began digging through Mendocino County news, and greater California news, and generally poured my finely honed research skills into finding out what might have impacted Davey when he was 10 years old.
Yes. I did this. With the crazed fangirl devotion I thought I outgrew a decade ago. It wasn’t until weeks (and a theory about Davey’s fascination with CA wildfires and people who set them–which kind of bears out under his fixation on arson in Pop Kids) later that I realized it was a reference to Orwell’s 1984: the future’s here, it’s 1985. Davey’s way of saying that he’s writing about his own dystopian future; that the worst he could imagine and the worst he could have feared is here, and he’s worried now that it’s immutable, that this is how it will be forever. Continue reading
Tonight, In the Whispers 