Drink! a Different Kind of Anthem for Alcohol
A look at They Might Be Giants' song about the person who has a problem with drinking. And the very personal memories where alcohol deteriorated my childhood view of the people around me.
One year on Christmas Eve, my uncle Ron was in a mood that seemed much happier than one simply driven by the Christmas Spirit and company of his extended family. Even at the tender age of nine years old, I knew this meant uncle Ron had been drinking.
The other clue that he’d managed to drink alcohol during my grandma’s stern no-booze-this-year rule, was the bottle of Crown Royale that found stashed in the back water tank of the toilet in the bathroom. The sound of the bottle clanking around when I flushed had betrayed his secret. At one point in the night, he was trying to rough house around with me and his other nephew and in doing so, managed to basically smash our small child sized heads together.
I didn’t like when my uncle Ron was drunk. He seemed so fun and laughable, and the other adults seemed to enjoy it but I knew he wasn’t acting like himself. It made me uncomfortable and it was also entirely out of my control.
My uncle Rhett had a very red and puffy face at most family get togethers. That’s my uncle Ron’s older brother. Both are my mom’s brothers. Uncle Rhett had me and my little sister over to spend the night once. I was fourteen and by then, my sister was nine. My mom wanted to me to tag along with my sister because of my uncle Rhett’s drinking.
Not “hey, I can’t be having either of my children spending the night or riding around with you because your drinking is unsafe and I don’t want to put my kids in an unsafe position.” No. My mom would always choose the path that put me in the position of being responsible and making a call. Reading the situation and telling someone no instead. Which I wasn’t good at since I was fourteen.
Somehow, in my mom’s head, it made sense to have her teenager “with the old soul” go keep her nine year old daughter safe from her alcoholic brother. Even though I would also have to ride in the car that he is driving.
Anyway.
We rode from his house in his car to a video store to rent whatever movie my sister wanted (on VHS because it was the 90’s.) I don’t remember the words that were said but my uncle was talking very loudly and made some comments to the store clerk who must have been just 3 years older than me now that I look back. And those comments were not okay.
His face was red and puffy.
I didn’t want to have ride back in the car with him but since this was like 1994 or some shit, I had no way to reach out to my mom. Her god awful plan that was doomed to fail; failed. The car ride back was extremely stressful. Constantly observing the driving situation.
“Is he staying in the right lane?”
“Can I see what speed he’s going?”
“How do I tell him that he’s driving too fast?”
“I should have refused to let my sister in the car and called home from the video store.”
My sister and I survived but I often wonder how she remembers that time. If she does at all. Did I “succeed” in making sure she had a normal experience and a good safe time? Did I mom stay up the whole weekend feeling worried or anxious at all? Did she regret sending me along or was this out-of-sight-out-of-mind once I was “in charge” at fourteen?
The Sarcastic Drinking Anthem
By the time I first heard Drink! on They Might Be Giants’ Mink Car album, my uncle Ron had ended his own life a few years prior, and my uncle Rhett would die from liver failure a few years later.
Drink! is a song that sounds like a drinking song. Like a “Danny Boy the pipes” kind of thing. The band says, no. That it’s quite the opposite. It is a song about someone who has a problem with drinking. And that’s how I’ve always heard it. As a warning from the sometimes sarcastic voice of the narrator saying, “Oh sure, let’s just drink until we’re buried alive. Sounds… great.”
The song starts off with the narrator having a conflict with someone. He’s taking back the fun party supplies because the drinking friend is acting wildly out of control with the bar’s billiard equipment:
I'll take back my piñata, it's wasted on you
Just spinning that pool cue all over the room
And give back the blindfold that's under your shoe
The Terrible Thing About Alcoholism
My mom had two more brothers, each with their own alcoholism and each with some wildly inappropriate stories. To this day, when people I feel very close to in my life are very drunk - to the point where their personality shifts entirely, I feel my nervous light up. It’s trying to warn me, based solely on my past, that this person might hurt me in this state. I’ve learned how to trust and let people show up as themselves without first assigning labels based on my history that is completely separate from them. But the feeling remains. That might not be such a terrible thing.
Everyone in my family knew that alcohol was a problem running its course through everyone. Especially, my grandma, who repeatedly wanted a dry holiday dinner. No matter how much emotional or physical pain was caused amongst them on account of drinking, everyone was quick to sweep it under the rug and make no meaningful effort toward change or growth in any way.
And when my uncle’s mental health could no longer keep up with the drinking, the two things teamed up to help feel that the only solution was for him end things. And even then, the family was shocked. Nobody could understand how such a thing could happen.
You can’t? You can’t figure out how the person who was obviously struggling with depression and alcoholism, could end in this tragic of a way?
So, do I drink? Yeah. I have an amount that I’m comfortable with and have gone over that limit a few times. My disdain for feeling nauseous kind of prevents me from putting myself in that spot which I’m thankful for.
Can I Call a Friend to Drive This Essay Home for Me?
If I’m being honest, I sat to write without knowing exactly where this piece would go. I ended up visiting some memories that I haven’t thought if a very long time and it’s making me realize that I may have some new therapy quests unlocked. But I have no idea how to write a conclusion and tie this essay up in a neat a little bow when so much of it still feels like unhealed junk that hasn’t ever been resolved for me outside this newsletter.
Do end this with a disclaimer about alcoholism and leave a link and phone number to some support groups?1
I’ll leave you with some final thoughts on Drink! and the place it has in my fandom. This is a song that will always remind me of the family I’ve lost, the past partners who have hurt me, and the friendships that dissolved, because of their relationship with drinking.
It’s a simple and beautiful song about a deeply destructive and pervasive force that is alcoholism. I listen to it with a sort of emotional equivalent of pouring a little of your drink on the ground for the ones who fallen and left behind.
You’re reading one of my Mink Car essays. An album full of pop, depression, car accidents, and high fidelity.
See all Mink Car posts - Start Here
Dive deeper into TMBG lore at TMBW.net (fan-run and fantastic)
If you or a loved one has a problem with drinking, there is support available. Visit https://www.aa.org/aa-family-friend for resources and help.
I have to admit that I mostly appreciate TMBG for their music and what I perceive to be dark or ironic humor and Linnell's wordplay. Then again, my life hasn't had the kind of rough spots (or deep trenches) that cause these words to hit home for others and probably friends and loved ones for the Johns, or they themselves. (I know nothing about their personal bios outside of what's in Gigantic.) Anyway, I appreciate the way you open up the personal meanings of these songs for you, and draw my attention to the deeper poetry that I mostly process as amusing and intriguing sounds.
This song is really interesting. It opens with someone not only out of control, but the lyrics mention that the piñata blindfold is under their feet, so this person is willfully swinging at and smashing things around the room. They aren't playing piñata anymore, just being destructive, yet the chorus immediately calls for more drinks. Is this other person actually the narrator, recognizing their own harmful behavior after the fact?
The question of what rhymes with "buried alive" alludes to the narrator not having the words to express that feeling or maybe not in an acceptable way that can be laughed off in this social situation. Alcohol is so often turned to as the socially acceptable way to deal with stress or depression, yet it often just masks what is happening underneath, while the lowered inhibitions often cause destructive releases instead of healthy ones.
At the end, the reference to the monkey suit and cigarette break seems to reinforce that acceptance of drinking culture. Nobody blinks at the business person having a drink on their lunch or the executive having one midday from their wet bar. But if that wasn't socially acceptable... then they would have to be sad. And we can't have that. Better to drink and slowly be buried alive by those feelings we aren't supposed to acknowledge, while pretending to have fun. Go a little wild, play by the rules, win the prizes for best actor, and don't let anyone see what's happening inside.