“Kettering” by The Antlers

Imagine watching the person you love succumb to terminal illness. Hospice, an album by the The Antlers, tells the story of a woman’s end of life. Told through the perspective of her caretaker, the songs teem with harrowing nightmares and raw grief. The instrumentation, ranging from the atmospheric to the cacophonous, expresses every shade of despair. All of these qualities especially describe the first song, “Kettering”. The lyrics of this heartbreaking introduction relate the beginning of the story, giving us spare but sufficient detail—the failing body, the medical equipment, the growing cold—to piece together what happens:

‘Cause you’d been abused by that bone that refused you,

and you hired me to make up for that.

 

Walking in that room when you had tubes in your arms,

those singing morphine alarms out of tune.

 

When I was checking vitals I suggested a smile.

You didn’t talk for awhile, you were freezing.

Meanwhile, the speaker’s tender, wounded falsetto carries these haunting, turbulent lyrics above ethereal, reverberating piano chords. The song sounds like a dirge played in a cathedral. But the beautiful melody, despite the heavy subject matter, remains eerily calm, almost as though the singer has been hurt past hurting. This tension between the serene melody and intense keening intensifies when the relationship between caretaker and patient becomes more complicated:

The Antlers (Credit: http://antlersmusic.com/)

You said you hated my tone, it made you feel so alone,

and so you told me I ought to be leaving.

 

But something kept me standing by that hospital bed,

I should have quit but instead I took care of you.

 

You made me sleep all uneven, and I didn’t believe them

when they told me that there was no saving you.

Though told simply, the lyrics relate a complex experience of terminal illness. The patient resents the speaker’s words—of encouragement? of comfort? we don’t know—even as she depends on him. And he, in turn, allows her to disrupt his usual patterns, his better judgement, his ability to sleep. “Kettering” shows how the end of life can create a storm of feelings as mysterious as the finer details intimated but not expressed in the stark, personal lyrics to this beautiful song. We are left knowing so little but feeling so much.

Read the full lyrics on The Antlers website.

Listen to “Kettering” here:

More from A Rite of Passage:

• “Casimir Pulaski Day” by Sufjan Stevens
• “Will You Miss Me when I’m Gone?” by The Carter Family
• “Love Is Here to Stay” by George and Ira Gershwin