Better Things: This Is Old

"Better Things" is a series of weekly posts, each about one song I really love, by an artist I haven't featured in the previous This Year or Portions For Foxes series. See the introduction for more.

Every song means something slightly different to different people. And, sometimes, a song has a very specific resonance for you that's so distinct it's hard to explain.

This is one of those for me - This Is Old by State Shirt, a propulsive 2008 song from a band where I own this one record (this is the title song) and know basically nothing else about them.

I play video games a lot, and I like games where I can change or add to the soundtrack. This song is one of a couple dozen I added to the in-game "radio" in Grand Theft Auto IV - so I've heard it a lot, over the years, while pretending to steal cars and drive recklessly around a fictional version of NYC.

And, without intending it, I came to think of this song as about the protagonist of that game. (I know, I know: this is purely in my head, and entirely random. But the point of good art is that it makes connections, and these two pieces of art connected, at least in me.) So, oddly, idiosyncratically, I think of this as Niko Bellic's theme song.

Beaten down for so many years
It's just a job that never finds an end
Drained and drunk
Can never give it up
Sell off your friends
Wake up and do it all again

I hate all that I've become
And I hate every part of you
I've tried to drop out of this life
And abandon this divide
This is old, this is getting old

If you don't know the game or the character, it's just words - just some guy in a bad situation. But it's a compelling song even so - a strong, driving song. And the ending is just killer, just perfect. Over and over, the singer repeats:

The finest things in life I will always refuse
The worst things in life I will always abuse