Just another They Might Be Giants song. There’s still a lot more to come in this thing. Maybe I might have said that they’re one of my favourite musical groups ever. If I haven’t, which I’m sure isn’t the case, I’m saying it again. ‘Part of You…’ was initially released as the fifth and final promotional track in advance of the band’s then-upcoming album BOOK in 2021. Slightly over a year has passed since the record’s release, and I’ve come to feel that it’s probably their best since Join Us arrived in 2011. Though it’s all subjective. You can’t go wrong with all the other releases that came in between.

What ‘Part of You…’ is is a delightful three-minute power pop ditty, primarily composed by John Linnell out of the two Johns. The opening descending/ascending melody of the keyboard in the introduction drew me right away, and that it’s also the same melody that Linnell sings in the opening verse really buried it in the brain. There’s no real discernible chorus, but more three sections that each have their own distinct melody. There’s the opening verse, the “Tiny voices” section, and the “Somewhere else” section which goes over the chord progression of the introductory verse. They make up the first half of the song in that order and are then switched around to make up its second. You’ll understand what I’m blabbering on about when you actually listen to the thing. What really matters is Linnell – Flansburgh too, but he’s not the song’s writer – is a master of melody and good hooks in a song and that’s all on display yet again in this one.

I haven’t been able to wrap my head around what the track is about, though. Like a few other Linnell songs, the lyrics are framed in this circular, elliptical manner that you have to take some time to think about. Not in the “Oh, you really have to think about this, man.” way, but more in the “That’s a funny way of wording a simple thing.” manner. There are double-negatives, maybe even a triple, so it kind of adds a bit more for the brain to process. But, from my general understanding of themes that can show up in TMBG songs, I think Linnell is writing from the perspective of a narrator who has either lied or said something straight up wrong to another person, and that person – who has to take medication for unknown reasons – is having an internal struggle on whether this person is telling the truth. Then I think the rest of the track is about what is happening in this person’s body as they try to process this potential lie the narrator’s telling them. Just my two cents, though. It’s known that TMBG just want you to enjoy their songs and not analyse them so much. But it’s hard not to have the urge when the lyrics are written in such a unique manner.