Lyrics for Good Intentions Paving Company as interpreted by mutinyinheaven_x

Good Intentions Paving Company Lyrics
Twenty miles left to the show
Hello, my old country, hello
Stars are just beginning to appear
And I have never in my life before been here

And it's my heart, not me, who cannot drive
At which conclusion you arrived
Watching me sit here bolt upright and cry
For no good reason at the Eastering sky

And the tilt of this strange nation
And the will to remain for the duration
Waving the flag
Feeling it drag

Like a bump on a bump on a log, baby
Like I'm in a fist fight with a fog, baby
Step-ball-change and a pirouette
And I regret, I regret

How I said to you, "honey, just open your heart"
When I've got trouble even opening a honey jar
And that right there is where we are...

And I been 'fessing double fast
Addressing questions nobody asked
I'll get this joy off of my chest at last
And I will love you 'til the noise has long since passed

And I did not mean to shout, just drive
Just get us out, dead or alive
A road too long to mention, lord, it's something to see!
Laid down by the good intentions paving company

All the way to the thing we've been playing at, darlin'
I can see that you're wearing your staying hat, darlin'
For the time being all is well
Won't you love me a spell?

This is blindness beyond all conceiving
Well, behind us the road is leaving, yeah, leaving
And falling back
Like a rope gone slack

Well, I saw straight away that the lay was steep
But I fell for you, honey, as easy as falling asleep
And that right there is the course I keep...

And no amount of talking
Is going to soften the fall
But, like after the rain, step out
Of the overhang, that's all

It had a nice a ring to it
When the ol' opry house rang
So with a solemn auld lang
Signed, sealed, delivered, I sang

And there is hesitation
And it always remains
Concerning you, me,
And the rest of the gang

And in our quiet hour
I feel I see everything
And am in love with the hook
Upon which everyone hangs

And I know you meant to show the extent
To which you gave a goddang
You ranged real hot and real cold but I'm sold
I am home on that range

And I do hate to fold
Right here at the top of my game
When I've been trying with my whole heart and soul
To stay right here in the right lane

But it can make you feel over and old
Lord, you know it's a shame
When I only want for you to pull over and hold me
'Til I can't remember my own name



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2010
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aputney
04-24-2012

 Rated  0 
The tune and lyrics of this song work together in some interesting ways. Altogether, it seems like a taking stock of a relationship that is about-to-be, or in the process of getting established. The road she refers to seems metaphorical of the journey that a romantic relationship takes, and perhaps her
"old country" is that of her heart, returning to a place of love and affection where her heart has been before. The music and lyrics combined make me think this song is about recognizing the difficulties, the doom of a relationship as you enter into it while embracing the hardship to come (or present hardship, even). The tempo and melody of the first half of the song points to an interpretation that she may still be excited for the course of the relationship while recognizing its failures.

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General Comment
joannanewsom
01-23-2012

 Rated  0 
I've always felt this song was about battling depression and how it affects human relations. I definitely think it's because I myself am dealing and battling with anxiety/depression, but so many parts of this song are so... god. I feel like they came right from my feelings, especially at the end when the tempo slows:

"And I do hate to fold
Right here at the top of my game
When I've been trying with my whole heart and soul
To stay right here in the right lane

But it can make you feel over and old
Lord, you know it's a shame
When I only want for you to pull over and hold me
'Til I can't remember my own name"

It kind of reminds me of how I feel when I feel like I'm doing well, that I'm healing and getting better, and then I collapse and can't handle it. I need people, still, and I'm not fully independent. Earlier in the song when she talks about auld lang signed, sealed, delivered again, it reminds me of how I always create resolutions to heal and get better -- I send them off, I officialise them. My depression concerts "you, me, and the rest of the gang" and whatnot.

I feel like the beginning, too, even alludes to it. When the song sounds like her voice is "layered", I always hear it as a conversation, of people talking to her to snap out of it.

LMAO. I don't know. I'm a bit ridiculous but this song has really gotten me out of some tough spots. Always makes me break down tbh.

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General Comment
ChazA3
11-01-2011

 Rated  0 
It seems fairly simple: "Honey, I know you care a whole lot about me, and I care about you too, but I don't know what's going to happen."

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My Interpretation
SparkleNShine
09-03-2011

 Rated  0 
I really thought it was "Just get us out and over a line" like a border or state line. I'm bummed cuz it was my favorite.

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General Comment
Scream1008
06-15-2011

 Rated  -1 
Maybe I'm just a perv, but I really can't help hearing "I'll get this joy off of my chest and ass."

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General Comment
kbphonosemantics
03-29-2011

 Rated  0 
Does anyone else think this song reminds them of Joyce Carol Oates' Arthur Friend?

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General Comment
TheLostEyeSight
03-22-2011

 Rated  0 
I always thought she said "And it's my heart, not me, who cannot PLY" While it would make sense, I think "DRIVE" makes even more sense, given the context of the rest of the song.

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My Opinion
mjbx
01-12-2011

 Rated  0 
A lot of Joanna's songs often interweave a couple of different themes, like for instance, "Only Skin" is a composite of 3 different events in her life.

This story seems to have a strong political theme at the start, then turn largely personal at the end. Terms like "waving the flag, feeling it drag", "in a fist fight with the fog", the "tilt to this strange nation", the direct reference to the road to hell being paved with "good intentions", it almost sounds like a commentary on how the United States is quagmired in two dubious "wars".

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1 Reply  ·  Song Meaning
ericaruth
09-19-2010

 Rated  +2 
this song is a description of the narrator's relationship progressing, developing, and becoming stronger daily. the relationship is not, however, without its problems.

after a period of peaceful, happy romance (see "'81"), the woman and her lover run into some trouble. she goes on to tell her lover that she regrets how she told him to open his heart (in "easy"), "when [she's] got trouble even opening a honey jar." when she says, "and that right there is where we are..." she is explaining that the problem at hand is one of her lover having finally let her in, only to find her unable to reciprocate fully. maybe this is why she's decided to take him home to meet the folks and see where she grew up? this indicates that he is, perhaps, not the one making the relationship difficult. here, in this song, we begin to see a picture of the narrator's unreliable emotional state unfolding: she may be someone that is simply hard to be in a relationship with, someone who is not easy to love because of her emotional fluctuations.

anyhow, we now have our current scene: the two lovers taking a trip to the narrator's "old country," which she has presumably moved away from quite some time ago. she feels like she does not recognize the place that she once called home, probably because she has changed so much over the years. feelings of nervousness and anxiety begin to overwhelm her : "i did not mean to shout 'just drive! just get us out, dead or alive!'"

now that she has taken this "leap" in an attempt to make him feel as if she's truly letting him in, she states that "for the time being all is well," and asks him to simply accept that and love her for a while. she convinces him that she fell for him "as easy as falling asleep." she knows that no amount of talking is going to make things better once they start to go bad (presumably she knows that they will because she knows his character and also her own), but for now she's going to try to make it work and enjoy the quiet, loving period of their romance.

the mere idea of the trip is, for lack of better words, really freaking the narrator out. she knows that she's "at the top of [her] game" right now, taking him to her family and her hometown was a great idea for the relationship, but she doesn't want to go. perhaps it's a bad memory there, or perhaps she just isn't ready to take the relationship to that next level. she doesn't want to fold and turn around, and is trying with her "whole heart and soul to stay right here in the right lane." she ends this segment by stating that all she really wants is for her lover to pull over and hold her-- for a very, very long time, "'til [she] can't remember [her] own name."

please remember that this is only my attempt to interpret the whole album, "chapter" by "chapter". i'm trying to not only make sense of each piece as an individual song, but fit them together to form the cohesive narrative that miss newsom intended them to be. i'm not saying my interpretation is as she intended it, but i figured i'd go ahead and share it with you lovely people since i've read your comments for so long without ever adding my own.


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General Comment
buggyo
09-01-2010

 Rated  +1 
"20 miles left to the shore" is the correct lyric...

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Lyric Correction
fog_za
04-23-2010

 Rated  -2 
Does anyone else feel this song is about the Afghanistan / Iraq invasion?

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2 Replies  ·  My Opinion
deeewooh
04-09-2010

 Rated  0 
The best from the new album

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General Comment
lrosehf
04-06-2010

 Rated  0 
does anybody get a really clear picture of Joanna and Andy S. driving to her hometown for the first time, taking him home to meet the place she came from? well, i do. i don't know why Andy and not just any of her past lovers but something about the humor of the song speaks to me of him. even though i clearly don't know the first thing about him. Or her.


and the line "Watching me sit here bolt upright and cry/For no good reason at the Eastering sky" just describes that feeling SO SO PERFECTLY. i've never been able to put words to that indescribable balloon-in-your-ribcage feeling that just makes you cry...

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1 Reply  ·  General Comment
monolisar
03-28-2010

 Rated  +1 
This song really, really resonates with me, in my current romantic situation. A lot of the lyrics fit perfectly with what I'm feeling about my now ex-boyfriend.
"No amount of talking is going to soften the fall" was the first lyric I read, on a friend's facebook. It was absolutely perfect timing when it came to me.
"How I said to you, "honey, just open your heart"
When I've got trouble even opening a honey jar
And that right there is where we are..."
God. it's so true.

So this song, for me, really feels like it talks about a relationship that could be so good, but just cannot work and has to be let go. It's perfectly somber.
Especially the last two stanzas. It's like, "I am so tired, and I know this cannot work, but i just want it to so bad. i just want you to hold me."

SORRY FOR BEING ALL MELODRAMATIC AND SHARING MY PERSONAL PROBLEMS OVER THE INTERNET. I KNOW IT'S ANNOYING. BUT I HAD TO.

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1 Reply  ·  Memory
srsizzy
03-06-2010

 Rated  0 
I see this about the road of living through a relationship. Lots of metaphors about fighting, stubbornness, compromise, and the "good intentions paving company" is a metaphor for how we all go into this road with good intentions.

The melody of this song is amazing.

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General Comment
nthdegree
03-04-2010

 Rated  0 
Wow. I've been trying to digest this for a while now - and now that I've read the real lyrics, I've been trying to piece it together in my mind.

I think this song is about Joanna returning to California as a changed person, feeling like she doesn't recognized her home. In the moment, she's overwhelmed by questions no one else is asking, feeling like what she has known is no longer hers, and she is unhappy with where we are all headed. Suddenly she realizes that we're all traveling on the road she's on as well - and she thinks about the journey, rather than the destination.

"And I did not mean to shout "JUST DRIVE!!!"
Just get us out, dead or alive
A road too long to mention, lord, it's something to see!
Laid down by the good intentions paving company"

She admits that there is nothing we can do about the past, "it's falling back, like a rope gone slack".

The following lovey part of the song (which is wonderful), I interpret as her proclamation love for both a lover and her life. She suggests that falling in love is the "course she keeps" - that love will determine where she is headed in life, and that will make it worthwhile and beautiful. She's been trying so hard to keep her life going the right way, that by allowing herself to be controlled by love, she is giving up a sense of security to gain an intense feeling of mutual security, which may, in turn, pave her road to hell, but the last line sums up all her feelings spectacularly. At least she's not doing it all alone.

Just some of my over-simplified thoughts about the greatest song ever written. :)

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My Interpretation
emueyes
02-24-2010

 Rated  -1 
I think the talk about tilt and the recurrence of the word "right" probably are in some way a commentary on politics. Not to mention "waving the flag and feeling it drag." I'm not really sure what she is saying, yet.

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3 Replies  ·  My Interpretation
noseforsharpies
02-23-2010

 Rated  0 
The entire song is framed by the old adage fadingripple mentioned, pretty much - "the road to hell is paved with good intentions." Joanna is acknowledging that the course of love she's taken is leading her straight to Hell, but by song's end, she still wants "to stay right here in the right lane." Most of the song, though, seems to be centered on her observations about the relationship, about the world, and, by extension, about herself . . At the VERY end, she desires to just pull over, to opt OUT of adages and courses pre-laid by fictional companies. Gorgeous.

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General Comment
fadingripple
02-22-2010

 Rated  +1 
the road to hell is paved with good intentions.

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General Comment
Elegnaim
02-22-2010

 Rated  +1 
It's like Dolly Parton meets Syd Barrett, in the best possible way imaginable.

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General Comment
twocent
02-19-2010

 Rated  +1 
I love that she's channeling a bit of Dolly Parton in her new vocal stylings, much more controlled than I've heard before-"The'Ol Opry house rang..."
I look forward to her long and impassioned career.

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General Comment
iamsoupcombust
02-18-2010

 Rated  +1 
"just get us out, get home alive" is "just get us out, dead or alive"

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Lyric Correction
ryantheduke
02-16-2010

 Rated  0 
mcmurrow.. that's exactly what I hear. Clever little play on words. I love her so much.

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Lyric Correction
Mcmurrow
02-15-2010

 Rated  0 
I may be crazy, but the only thing I can figure out here is:

It had a nice a ring to it
When the old opera house rang
So with a song I'm Auld Lang
"Signed, sealed, delivered" I sang

Which seems weird written down, but makes sense sung.

At any rate, this is a fantastic song.

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1 Reply  ·  Lyric Correction
GoodIntentionsPaver
02-06-2010

 Rated  -1 
I think "And the guilt of this strained nation"
is "and the tilt of this strange nation"

"I've got trouble even opening a honey jar"
is "I've got trouble even opening a front door"

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4 Replies  ·  General Comment




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