[Verse 1]
They could prescribe you any illness you like, if you define the terms of your ailment
You could sing a pretty melody, like a black canary, but a crow don't know the smell of carbon monoxide
How many years have you been on that couch? They coulda quilt you in the throes, by now
You draw a line in the sand, where it ends and you begin, but the tide rolls in, so who knows?

[Chorus 1]
Oh well and a little identity never hurt nobody, oh but lately you've been focusing too much on yourself
So how many milligrams of you are still left in there?
‘Cause back in my day we didn't need no feel-good pills, and no psychiatrist
No we just drank ourselves to death, and goddammit we liked it

[Short instrumental]

[Verse 2]
Who makes the call, what's a symptom, what’s a flaw? Could it be both? Well I suppose that’s some kind of answer
Would you give up your humanity for just a touch of sanity? ‘Cause god knows, it’s not like its cancer!
And good news to the purist, they discovered a cure for the symptoms of being alive
It’s a painless procedure with a low rate of failure, but very few patients survive!

[Chorus 2]
And a little conformity never hurt nobody, but lately I've been worried that you're losing yourself
So how many milligrams of you are still left in there?
‘Cause back in my day we didn't need no feel-good pills, and no psychiatrist
No we just bled out in our baths, and goddammit we liked it

[Instrumental]

[Bridge]
Lover, why do you turn out the lights?
If beauty's in the eyes of those beholding, could you hold me closer?
We get dressed to impress, I guess, in layer after layer to get off our chests
It’s cold out now, we can take it off later
Better safe than sorry and we both know the dangers
So doctor, could you run another test?
Got a feeling this time I might just pass it, well if you raise the average!
We all sing when the bell curve rings, in lyrics symptomatic of the way we think
If our harmonies don't sync, we can change our voices, our chorus unconditional of diagnosis

[Chorus 3]
So back in my day we didn't need no feel good pills, and no psychiatrist
In fact, in a way, we didn't need those evil wills of all those nihilists
I said back in the days of lobotomies, shock therapies, and mad scientists!
Oh we just drank ourselves to death, and goddammit—

[Instrumental solo]

[Final verse]
Is your identity at stake? Does aspirin kill you with the pain?
You're not your thoughts, you're not your brain, you're just that character you've made
Up in your head, down in your heart, what seem like separate body parts
Just come together to believe they're you, and not just chemistry
It’s not the way you were raised, not what the advertisements say
Not what you pay for, what you pray for, what you want or what you say
And I see your tendency to redefine disease by what you need, and I'm afraid I can't prescribe the diagnosis that you seek
But something tells me that you need, forgive me now if I misspeak, but something tells me that you like, yeah something tells me—
That you need
To be sitting there flipping through those old issues of People
Okay goodbye same time next week