[This is song about how the media sharks would take my writings and songs and twist them if I committed a mass murder. How my words would Ted Bundy me. How they would accuse my wife, friends, parents of missing the signs. The retrospective Detective spelunking twist dance. ] [Verse 1] They found my words after the sirens After the cameras filled the street Started digging through the rubble For a prophecy beneath the beat There was a joke about the darkness There was a song about a dream There was something about the silence That suddenly meant more than it seemed [Pre-Chorus] Funny how the ending changes Every sentence that came before Once you know how the story finishes You can make anything a warning at the door [Chorus] Warning signs — a retrospective rewrite Take the strange and make it sinister overnight Circle every shadow, underline every line “Look, he told us all along” Yeah, hindsight’s doing fine Warning signs Or just a songwriter’s mind? [Verse 2] I wrote about fear that killed a marriage I wrote about aliens in the night I wrote about a white Crayola And made absurdity feel right I called myself an empathy vampire Sucking stories through my veins Watching people watching people Trying to understand their pain [Pre-Chorus] Then somebody says, “He was unbalanced” Somebody else says, “We should’ve known” A talking head discovers patterns In a life they never really owned [Chorus] Warning signs — a retrospective rewrite Take the strange and make it sinister overnight Circle every shadow, underline every line “Look, he told us all along” Yeah, hindsight’s doing fine Warning signs Or just a songwriter’s mind? [Bridge] My wife didn’t see a monster My friends didn’t see a threat They saw the guy who wouldn’t stop Following some strange thought to its end But give a shark tank microphones And a headline needing blood Every weird little sentence Can be turned into a flood They’ll say: “Why didn’t anybody notice?” “Why didn’t anybody call?” Because maybe strange isn’t dangerous And maybe darkness isn’t evil at all [Break] And there it is… The click of silence. It’s never really silent. Boom-ba-ba-boom Boom-ba-ba-boom [Verse 3] Life’s an animal kingdom And we’re all out watching from the grass Rubbernecking at the wreckage Trying to understand the past Civil War spectators Watching armies tear apart Humans have always loved the spectacle Of somebody else’s broken heart So maybe that’s my warning Maybe that’s my only crime: I kept staring at the strange things And kept turning them into rhyme [Final Chorus] Warning signs — a retrospective rewrite Every crazy thought becomes a neon light Every joke becomes a confession Every song becomes a crime Every silence becomes evidence When you’re reading it backward through time Warning signs Maybe there were none Maybe I was just an observer With a microphone and a loaded tongue Warning signs A retrospective rewrite The story changes underneath the light And if you need a villain for the headline tonight Well… I suppose my songs will Ted Bundy my legacy One lyric at a time. [Outro] So don’t worry about the silence Let the strange thoughts overflow Cerebrally paint the canvas Jackson Pollock what you know Because someday someone may read it And decide they know your mind… But they weren’t there when you wrote it. Boom-ba-ba-boom Boom-ba-ba-boom Warning signs… Or just another human being Trying to make sense of being human?
