Why You’d Want to Live Here (The Showbox, Seattle 5.08.04)

[Verse 1]
I'm in Los Angeles today
It smells like an airport runway
Jet fuel stenches in the cabin
And lights flickering at random

[Verse 2]
I'm in Los Angeles today
Garbage cans comprise the medians
Of freeways always creeping
Even when the population's sleeping

[Refrain]
And I can't see why you'd want to live here

[Verse 3]
I'm in Los Angeles today
Asked a gas station employee
If he ever had trouble breathing
And he said "It varies from season to season"

[Verse 4]
It's where our best are on display
Motion picture actors' houses
Maps are never ever current
So save your film and fifteen dollars

[Chorus]
And I can't see why you'd want to live here
Billboards reach past the tallest buildings
We are not perfect, but we sure try
As UV rays degradate, our youth with time

[Bridge]
The vessel keeps pumping us through this entropic place
In the belly of the beast that is Californ-I-A
I drank from a faucet, and I kept my receipt
For when they weigh me on my way out
Here, nothing is free, but the Greyhounds keep coming
Dumping locusts into the streets
'Til the gutters overflow and Los Angeles thinks
On a sunny day in June

[Verse 5]
It's a lovely summer's day
I can almost see a skyline
Through a thickening shroud of egos
Is this the city of angels or demons?

[Verse 6]
It's where the names are what remain
Stars encapsulate the golden lane
And they need constant cleaning
For when the tourists begin salivating

[Chorus]
And I can't see why you'd want to live here
Billboards reach past the tallest buildings
You can't swim in a town this shallow
As you will most assuredly drown tomorrow

[Outro (Spoken)]
Thank you very much everybody
Uh, is everybody having a good time tonight so far?
Good, good, good, good
It's
(Audience screaming)
I was gonna say something but forgot
It couldn't have been that important
Uh, this next song is off our latest record
It's for all of you