How Are You True

Album: Tell Me I'm Pretty (2015)
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Songfacts®:

  • Here, Matt Shultz reflects on how true he is to himself and whether he is living a worthwhile life. The song was inspired by a struggling musician that the Cage vocalist met on a plane ride. Shultz recalled to Entertainment Weekly:

    "I was coming back from New York to Nashville and there was this young kid, super flustered, on the [airplane's] jet bridge. The flight attendant asked him if he was going to Nashville to get a record deal and he was like, 'No, my label is sending me to rehab.' He was kind of playing into the rock 'n' roll persona and I thought, 'Oh no…' But I felt drawn to him; I had this feeling that I was supposed to talk to this kid.

    Low and behold, we get on the airplane and he's sitting right beside me. We started talking and he just kind of tells me his story - it was pretty heavy. I was really moved. And then it turned out his name was True, which I couldn't believe."
  • This is the Cage The Elephant song that bass player Daniel Tichenor is most proud of. He explained to Artist Direct:

    "When we got the first mix back, it provoked a lot of emotion. I felt like we had accomplished everything we went into the studio to do, but more importantly I just felt like we stuck true to ourselves and ended up writing something that we will forever be proud of."

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