Alive

Album: Life Imitating Life (2014)
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Songfacts®:

  • Augustana mainman Dan Layus told AbsolutePunk the story of this song: "That was a really important song, not only for a refreshing direction of Augustana as a songwriter, but just as a human, as a person," he said. "I was just in desperate need of writing something that felt good. That was at a time where I had turned a lot of things around. I've been sober for nearly three years now, not quite but we're getting there. At that time I was freshly on the wagon there, getting my life together and figuring out how to live my life in a really positive way. I needed to write and perform something every night that felt great and that wasn't so blue and wasn't so down. That song is what came out."

    "It flowers from being sober, I think," Layus continued. "It felt good to feel nervous at shows again. It felt good to feel butterflies and actually not be numb to everything around me all day and night, to actually be scared or excited or nervous, all those feelings that come back that I had sort of stuffed away and numbed for a lot of years. That's kind of what that's saying, and then it's also saying in the verses that this isn't a message and this isn't a lesson for anybody else. It's my experience. This isn't saying that this is going to work for everyone, it's just saying this is me and this is my experience. This is what I've been through, and now it feels so good to feel alive again. I know that road has been walked before, and that alludes to Life Imitating Life as well. It all ties together."

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