With clouds in the rearviewYou start humming alongTo the first verseOf your favorite songThat you quote each day with the words all wrong

So call me when the world looks bleakI love you but it’s hard to believeWith every day we’ll start to seeThe rest is metamodernity

With agrestic charmIt’s humid in the midwestFrom June to JulyAll beneath a pinkish sky from the wildfiresWhich mantle the horizon line

From the outsetIt’s been hard to tellWhy I’d feel this downWhen it all bodes well

So call me when the world looks bleakI love you but it’s hard to believeWith every day we’ll start to seeThe rest is metamodernity

Full Lyrics

In the tranquil yet emotive track ‘Metamodernity,’ the indie-pop duo Vansire crafts a heartfelt ode to the contemporary human condition. With effortless melody and gentle poise, these lyrics navigate the complex landscape of our era’s ethos—one that oscillates between forward-thinking ambition and a certain yearning for moments of old.

The song, with its poetic dalliance through themes of love, loss, and the march of time, serves as a vessel. The vessel carries its listeners on an introspective journey, exploring the nuances of living in an age where the modern and the antiquated, the bright and the bleak, beautifully entwine.

Setting the stage with a panorama of Hudson Yards, the lyrics immediately immerse us in the tangible rush of the New York weekdays. This meticulously crafted landscape is not merely geographic but a mindset—between the stoic towers of progress and the ongoing pursuit of dreams.

The juxtaposition of singing about these metropolitan experiences while in LA highlights a dichotomy; the stark contrast between two cities renowned for their differing cultural auras. The song traverses this expanse, binding East to West coast in a collective urban heartbeat.

With the invocation of a ‘favorite song,’ Vansire underscores the universal experience of music as a personal soundtrack. The earnest mistake of misquoting lyrics further humanizes this connection, adding layers of individuality to a shared phenomenon, emphasizing our imperfect bonds to music that shape our narrative.

This miscue does not simply provide charm but speaks to a deeper truth of our interactions with art. It suggests that perfection is not necessary for profound attachment or love—our own interpretations and foibles can create intimacy with the songs that define us.

Calling out for connection in a ‘world [that] looks bleak,’ the duo encapsulates a powerful emotional dichotomy surrounding metamodern relationships. It is an expression of love, both desperate and hesitant, in an era filled with both disenchantment and boundless hope.

The theme of perseverance through uncertainty emerges as a refrain for romantics walking alongside the cynics of our generation. This seesaw of faith and doubt in love is not simply melodramatic—it is the pulse of a heart in metamodernity.

The term ‘metamodernity’ might evade some, serving as the song’s cryptic crescendo. It’s a conceptual framing, a lens to view our current cultural phase, one where modernity and postmodernity coalesce with neither prevailing, co-creating a state of playful sincerity and informed naiveté.

In the context of this track, metamodernity becomes a backdrop, a descriptor of stark contrasts and the blending of yesteryears with forthcoming horizons. It manifests here as an artistic meditation on how we process our fast-moving reality, balancing the weight of our collective history with the lightness of tomorrow.

Vansire’s heartstrings are tugged as ‘agrestic charm’ and ‘a pinkish sky from the wildfires’ builds a canvas, placing environmental preoccupations side by side with pastoral allure. It’s a telling contrast—one that paints the modern struggle against an endemic anxiety.

The song then distills its essence into a few poignant lines that linger: ‘I love you but it’s hard to believe / With every day we’ll start to see / The rest is metamodernity.’ These words become a banner for the contemporary love story, fraught with skepticism but holding on, insistent on witnessing the rest of what’s to come, with all its blended and borrowed time.