This song represents the post-“Merriweather Post Pavilion” blues of the band. That album was their first proper mainstream hit, meaning the band weren’t used to the extensive touring that it resulted in.
The “highway” in the song represents the limbo between one venue and the next and the repetitio...
I’m on a highway
I take a mental picture
Of the place that I live
Now it’s living in me
On a highway
Thinking of the one who
I left alone and hoping
I don’t know how I’m coping
On a highway
On a highway
I let the bad things taunt me
Why do they want to haunt me?
I don’t know how they find me
On a highway
I’ll watch the singing driver
Only speak with fingers
He mouths the words he should say
On a highway
Two pretty lady passengers
Their toes against the window
Are tapping to the tunes they
Are on a highway
And though they aren’t moving
They move by conversation
I pretend to know what they say
On a highway
Can’t say how long it’s been today
I wake against the window
That’s caked in cold saliva
On a highway
And when they call me lucky
For all the places I stay
It’s hard for me to not say
I can’t wait
To find home
On a highway
Hypnotized by sunstroke
As passing by some deer bones
Flowers for the dead grow
On a highway
There are some workers pissing
It starts my bladder itching
Can I wait for the exit?
On a highway
The median’s green forever
I’ll let some hash relax me
Get lost in human pleasure
On a highway
I’m sick from too much reading
Jealous of Noah’s dreaming
Can’t help my brain from thinking
I can’t wait
To find home
Animal Collective released On a Highway on Mon Nov 23 2009.