Cloud Nothings’ ‘Our Plans’ is a song of few lines. “Original – it’ll never get old”, “Essential – it’ll never get old”, “There’s no time for another try”, “No one knows our plans for us”, and “We won’t last long”. Five in total, that’s all. I mean, they are each repeated in various sections of the track’s structure. That’s very much what makes the track succeed. The reliance on repetition. Makes it just that bit more memorable. From the band’s 2012 album Attack on Memory, the song is in the penultimate slot. While listeners may just be waiting to see how the whole album ends at that point, I’d put in my two cents and say that ‘Our Plans’ is worth a close listen.

The track overall showcases a tight performance by all band members involved, and with Steve Albini’s production, the drums in particular sound absolutely chaotic and incredibly powerful. Even with the limited number of lyrics available to work with, I think I’ve been able to come to an understanding on the sentiment of them. Assuming they’re frontman Dylan Baldi’s lyrics and his alone – all of their tracks are credited to the band as a whole on the album, so it may not be the case – they seem to basically highlight the pressures of being in a band and making music. The pressure of being essential, original, timeless, getting things right in the least amount of takes. With the final chorus lyric being, “We won’t last long”, it seems that Baldi doesn’t think the band will be able to withstand all of these things that are asked of them. Luckily, this was about 10 years ago, and the band are still going strong today.

And that’s it for Cloud Nothings material from Attack on Memory unfortunately. ‘Cut You’ would have had a post for itself, but I had started writing posts for songs beginning with ‘D’ before I even knew who the band was. There was once a time when I really liked ‘Stay Useless’ too, but after a while each subsequent listen had less and less of an effect on me. Here and Nowhere Else is still my favourite album made by the band, and there’s still one more track to write about from that.