So We Can Stay Alive

Album: Strange Little Birds (2016)
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Songfacts®:

  • This song finds Shirley Manson singing of grappling with mortality. "The more that I see the clock ticking, the more it gives me fuel," she said. "It's a song to all the things that keep you moving forward with passion, all the things that can be used as fuel. All these things you think aren't good can be used as powerful material to enhance your life."
  • The song also touches on global concerns and the fragility of our existence. Manson told Entertainment Weekly: "We talk about human rights, and we're unaware that once human rights have been secured, they need to be safeguarded or they will disappear. We've grown up with a generation that just believes they're entitled to human rights. They don't necessarily understand what human rights actually are and how vigilant and proactive and political you sometimes have to get so that we don't devolve."

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