One Day On A Whim

Tame Impala “One More Year”

“One More Year” has a deep resonance with me, so deep that it makes me realize that it’s actually sort of rare that I fully identify with the words of songs in a way that reflects my actual lived experience. Kevin Parker is essentially singing in this song about the cost of committing oneself to a project that becomes a vocation that becomes the center of your existence. He sings the song with some ambivalence about throwing himself so fully into his life’s work, noting that it’s all he’s ever wanted but acknowledging that it hasn’t given him space to experience much else. He’s noticing how many possibilities are being closed off, and while he’s not yearning for anything in particular he still feels some nagging sense of FOMO. “I know we promised we’d be doing this until we die,” he sings, “and now I fear we might.”

But despite the anxieties expressed in the lyrics, “One More Year” feels quite relaxed and soothing in its steady groove and layers of wavy synths. It sounds like it’s coming from outside of time somehow, with Parker looking at his feelings from a perspective that takes them seriously but understands how little it all matters as time continues to pass. The big cathartic epiphany of the song is just Parker deciding to let the worry rest and give himself another year. Another year to procrastinate, another year to do the work, another year to avoid confronting his fears, another year to experience life and see where it all goes. When it comes down to it, “one more year” is the best we can hope for. Just being alive can be enough.

This song feels so right for this year, in which everything feels uncertain and possibilities are closed off and time seems to move differently. There’s one particular line – “we’re on a roller coaster stuck on its loop-de-loop” – that feels like a pretty good metaphor for how the world feels in the spring of 2020. It’s like we’re all just dangling in suspense indefinitely, and everyone trapped in this precarious situation interprets with varying levels of panic and boredom depending on their mindset. Some people, and by “some people” I mean me a little bit, might even feel a thrill at the novelty of it all and the challenge of figuring out how to make the best of it.

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