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grow your hair long if you​’​re wanting to see something that you can change

by Field Medic

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  • Record/Vinyl + Digital Album

    Limited to 400 Copies. Released by Run For Cover Records

    Includes unlimited streaming of grow your hair long if you’re wanting to see something that you can change via the free Bandcamp app, plus high-quality download in MP3, FLAC and more.
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  • Streaming + Download

    Includes unlimited streaming via the free Bandcamp app, plus high-quality download in MP3, FLAC and more.
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      $8 USD  or more

     

  • Cassette + Digital Album

    Released by Run For Cover Records

    *This is a digital approximation of the cassette art, final cassette art may vary.

    *Please note that this item is a pre-order that will ship to arrive around street date (October 14, 2022)

    Includes unlimited streaming of grow your hair long if you’re wanting to see something that you can change via the free Bandcamp app, plus high-quality download in MP3, FLAC and more.
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      $12 USD or more 

     

1.
i wanna fall off the face of the earth & probably die i tried laughing it off but i’m gonna cry i put myself into the ring & i looked in to the bulls eyes i did it for everyone else i thought that it’d make them like me but some things they never change & i’ll never fit drinking makes me insane but being sober makes me fret i light a cigarette to pass the time but it’s only as good as long as it’s lit it’s hard to explain why i’m always down & out it’s just always emptiness
2.
weekends 02:46
weekends are the hardest part always feel like i’ve gotta see someone but what if i aint got no one to see? what if aint no one wanna see me yeah weekends are the hardest way to be… four pm start the whiskey sweat make use my hands roll a cigarette step outside to light a match smoke my stoge no time has passed weekends seem to last and last and last i see what everyone’s up to but who feels the same way that i do? all alone in my room just waiting for sleep to come? cuz being is the hardest part always feel like i gotta be someone what if i don’t like the way i look since time crept up on me like a crook being is so lonely what the fuck what if i don’t like the way i feel since my luck ran cold & i can’t shake the chill? being is too heavy after all these years when your spirit’s broke you can’t even buy a spark & weekends are the hardest part
3.
i had a dream that you died we’re not the closest but you’re a friend of mine i woke up & realized it was my subconscious showing me what it would be like if this situation gets anymore out of hand all of my sorta friends will be like: “whoa i kinda knew that guy” so i keep fighting each day against this avalanche i feel like a lava lamp the way that i’ve been totally fucked by time i had a dream that you died somehow made it about me & i had a dream that i saw a blue whale jump out of the water standing on the docks it took me back to omaha for no reason other than the happiness i felt that so often seems lost & then i got to thinking how recently a lot i ponder suicide but i could never do that to my mom so i keep fighting each day against this maelstrom i feel like a chia pet the way my hair looks dumb and my heart is made of stone i had a dream that i saw a blue whale i was happy
4.
noonday sun 02:42
sitting in the noonday sun waiting for the end to come lord don’t keep me long if i die i die that’s how i felt at the time now i know life goes on but in the confines of this moment i feel forever broken i won’t know what the meaning is til i can look back in time until i’ve crossed the finish line cleaned up the wreck from this recklessness feels like i’m riding in a hearse everything went from bad to worse it’s a world war inside my mind i know it’s over & i’m okay but there’s still a price to pay it’s that far away look in my eyes i wish this circumstance was holy they said jesus suffered by his lonely but i know i’m not him it was a natural disaster the kind that happens when your back’s turned not your fault but it’s your consequence
5.
i think about you often when i close my eyes you tumble like an acrobat through my dreams at night i create a life for us a life inside my mind i think about you often i think about you all the time when i hear your voice in a whisper to me it feels like leisure my heart’s a dark shroud your heart is book bound handwritten note on my dresser will this feeling last forever? i’m all twisted up like MC escher can’t find my way out labyrinth bowie now it’s bittersweet to remember
6.
house arrest 04:01
lay your head down child let the years progress you went against mothers wishes wound up on house arrest there’s no use looking back now being pulled from the wreck you’ve always been an impulsive spirit now you pay your debt but one day there will come a morning when you wake up from this bad dream grow your hair long if you’re wanting to see something that you can change sometimes there’s no reason it’s just unfortunate that you must cry in a private panic with no hope of revenge only in sleep your weightless exhumed of all consequence you contemplate blowing all the lights out to never rise again
7.
this is the trouble i’m in it’s unbelievable it’s a bad trip crisis on top of crisis it’s like stained glass when the light hits i know this aint god punishing me this is a reckoning for my own stupidity it feels like the closing scene the credits begin to roll every morning & when i remember the specifics of everything it’s a shot of adrenaline i can’t stop worrying this can’t be happening
8.
i need a miracle or a marigold or anything to distract my mind from this terrible, hysterical situation that i find myself drawn into like bladee said: “nightmare’s coming true” i get lost in the hall of my memory retracing every move between what i should’ve done & what did happen & every wise choice i didn’t choose i look back so much it’s hurting my neck cuz the truth is too absurd to accept i guess i’ve got no choice but to keep flexing through the pain i hope this is just a funny story to tell one day you know that it’s bad when you don’t really believe in god but every night you close your eyes and pray
9.
i had my fun til my fun turned in to humiliation and a suicide scare i try to lead with love but i hurt everyone who gets close enough to show me that they care i cry alone in my room or out back with my finger down my throat expelling shame i can’t bear every day i say i’m done til i see that setting sun but tonight i’m gonna fight white knuckle i lost my passion & my looks my stomachs turning like a brook i told my best friend i wanted to buy a gun i don’t know how i wound up here feels like i lost so many years spend all my time saying sorry to everyone i don’t know how i wound up here the smallest thing brings me to tears & once their gone i am completely numb i don’t know how i wound up here i resent the insight of life experience all these lessons only bring me harm all these battles only leave me scarred oh how i long to go back to the start

about

Few songwriters are able to pinpoint difficult emotions and address them with such devastating clarity and disarming humor quite like Field Medic. The long-running musical project of Los Angeles-based musician Kevin Patrick Sullivan, he makes music that’s so startlingly honest that it can cut the tension in any room. He’s excelled at self-reflection and making deceptively simple folk songs about loneliness, sobriety, and growing up. But for his latest LP, grow your hair long if you're wanting to see something you can change, which is out October 14 via Run For Cover, Sullivan decided to completely reinvent his approach to recording. The result is his most ambitious, fully-formed, and emotionally resonant collection of tracks yet.

Most of Sullivan’s catalog as Field Medic has come from bedroom recorded moments of pure inspiration typically with just an acoustic guitar and a simple drum loop from a boombox. For his 2020 LP Floral Prince and other albums, he had employed what he lovingly calls his “full-time freestyle” method of songwriting: where he records as he writes and focuses more on stream-of-consciousness candidness over studio perfection. With these new songs that would eventually become grow your hair long, Sullivan needed a change. “I didn’t want to write the same song again,” says Sullivan. “I have songs about being on tour, I have songs about drinking too much, and falling in love. I needed a different approach to feel inspired to create.”

Where the recording process had always been a solitary affair for Sullivan, he decided to finally relinquish control and enlist producer and multi-instrumentalist Gabe Goodman to help him add a new feel to these songs. He decamped to Goodman’s Los Angeles studio and began tracking songs, allowing Goodman and a team of collaborators like steel guitarist Nick Levine of Jodi and drummer Nate Lich to flesh out the arrangements. “I've toyed with doing studio stuff for a while but it wasn't until I met Gabe and I felt comfortable with him that I decided to dive in,” says Sullivan. “I needed help to get out of a creative rut. It was through that process of working with Gabe that I was able to get excited about recording and writing again.”

The first track Sullivan brought to record was the LP opener “always emptiness” and the finished product is by far his most immaculately arranged and ambitious song yet. Hearing the track in a new context with a full band felt like a lightbulb moment for Sullivan. “Before the studio, I had been dealing with a lot of existential anxiety and a lack of inspiration,” says Sullivan. “But hearing these songs in this way was so exciting for me and it energized me to keep mining and writing. With these unexpected and fleshed-out arrangements, I was inspired to keep going.” Though he’d only brought a handful of already-written songs to the studio, Sullivan would find himself coming home from these sessions waking up in the middle of the night with a melody and a new line. It’s these sudden bursts of creativity that lead to four self-recorded and produced tracks that got him through the making of grow your hair long.

Lead single “i had a dream that you died” came about from one of these late-night moments of clarity. “I rolled over in bed and did a voice memo with that melody and then wrote the whole track out because I woke up from a dream that one of my friends died,” says Sullivan. “Very literal.” Despite being written over a couple of minutes, the track showcases his keen knack for a cohesive narrative. He sings, “I had a dream that you died / somehow made it about me.” This vision serves as a vessel for deeper self-reflection, recalling visions of being happy during his childhood contrasted with his darkest moments in depression in which he keeps “fighting each day / against this maelstrom / i feel like a chia pet / the way my hair looks dumb / and my heart is made of stone” This dichotomy between joy and despair is where Sullivan thrives both as an artist and a lyrical soothsayer, able to dive into these brutally dark moments with a smirk and a joke.

But while Sullivan had peppered humor into his previous albums, grow your hair long is his most heartfelt and brooding offering yet. Though “i think about you all the time” on first listen sounds like a traditional love song, according to Sullivan the song deals with his relationship to alcohol. Elsewhere, tracks like the string-laden closer “i had my fun-back to the start,” he gets almost self-lacerating in his introspection. He sings, “I lost my passion and my looks / my stomach's turning like a brook.” On single “Stained Glass,” he makes this anxiety tangible: “it’s a bad trip / crisis on top of crisis / it’s like stained glass / when the light hits.” But for Sullivan, this darkness isn’t for wallowing, it’s for clarity. It’s naming these persistent feelings, addressing them, and finding catharsis or healing.

grow your hair long is a triumphant picture of an artist diving deep into himself and coming out stronger than ever, both as a songwriter and as a person. It’s an example of Sullivan putting himself out there and laying bare the most devastating thoughts and emotions. Within these delicate and lovingly made songs, there’s an underlying and tangible hope someone finds their own struggles. “Music is definitely a vessel for some form of healing,” says Sullivan. “Sometimes the best way to get out of your own head is to just get to work. Making this album helped me find my happiness again.”

credits

released October 14, 2022

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