This song is most likely about both depression and sleep paralysis, detailing the experience of a man who is going through both of these. The “Bitter Friend” is either one of two things:
1. A metaphor for mental illness as a whole
2. A sleep paralysis demon
I won't let you in
Don't let it drag out, just let it end now
Pull your nails from my flesh, expose the open wound
Just let me feel it all, just let me suffer now
Remove the numbing shroud of smoke that you have swept me in
There is no rest, there's no relief
Can't close my eyes cause I see you in my sleep
Turned my heart into a hole
A restless fiend with a mark on my soul
A restless fiend with a mark on my soul
Oh, bitter friend, I won't let you in
Yet I feel you creeping under my skin
Oh, bitter friend, I won't let you in
Still you're creeping under my skin
I toss and turn at night, I'm losing grip on life
I can't keep going on, I'm giving up the fight
I feel you twist and turn around my neck
Like a snake, poison fangs sedate, frozen in place
My hands constrained
And as the pendulum swings, my time slips away
I know I made my bed, please just let me rot in it
Rather the reaper behind my back than this devil on my shoulder
I know I made my bed, just let me rot in it
Oh, bitter friend, I won't let you in
Yet I feel you creeping under my skin
Oh, bitter friend, I won't let you in
Still you're creeping under my skin
I toss and turn at night, I'm losing grip on life
I can't keep going on, I'm giving up the fight
Bitter Friend was written by Andreas Bjulver Paarup & Arsalan Sakhi & Malthe Strøyer Sørensen & Nikolaj Kaae Kirk & Chris Kreutzfeldt.
Bitter Friend was produced by Chris Kreutzfeldt.
CABAL CULT released Bitter Friend on Fri Jan 17 2020.