A War You Cannot Win

Album: A War You Cannot Win (2012)
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Songfacts®:

  • This is the title track of American metalcore band All That Remains' sixth studio album. Vocalist Phil Labonte explained the song's meaning to Noisecreep: "It's an F-U to the government," he explained. "No matter what the government does, they're not going to get away with taking away people's liberty. The American psyche, the ideas that most Americans have is one of independence – or it least it used to be. They're not going to be able to browbeat that out of people. There's always going to be people in the US who are going to say: 'I don't want to stick your nose into my business'. A lot of people to people to think that's a right of center opinion. It's not. In general – and I know I'm going to get crucified for this – in general, gay people tend to be left leaning. Democrats tend to be friendlier to them. Y'know what? If the government wasn't sticking their nose into your business you could marry whomever you wanted to. This issue wouldn't be marginalized. It's a contract between two people. The government doesn't have any right to tell you whom you can and can't marry. That's wrong. A lot of people don't realize that if you take the government out of the equation, things will tend to have better endings."
  • It was lead guitarist Oli Herbert who came up with this track. Guitarist Mike Martin told AllMusic: "Oli definitely writes the most music for the band, as far as parts go. He's a music machine. He came in, and it was fully arranged right away. A lot of times, we'll hear things, and everybody will collectively pick it apart. We'll tweak everything to make everybody happy. Oli came in with the title track, and everybody loved the whole thing right away. We played through, and we didn't want to change any of it."

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