The lives that we bump into during Quiet Life songs are of the sort that we'd surely mistakenly underestimate in movies. They'd be lived by the people who aren't hiding things, but they're not very showy. They keep to themselves. They're humble and intriguing. They aren't the people with motives or the ones holding the murder weapons, but they're the people who deliver the golden lines - the soliloquies that are remembered well after the lights have popped back on. They are the people who, cleverly or just accidentally, deliver the meaning of the story, or just something nice to chew upon.
The lives that we hear about in Quiet Life songs are understated, but they're examined and they've had most of the shine rubbed off of them. They are like the pair of jeans that have the knees worked through and tiny holes forming at the corners of the back pockets, where you can see the white of the underwear beneath. They're comfortable, but they've obviously been through plenty. They've been snagged and shredded, but they still get washed and they still get worn. The people that we encounter here have tans that were brought on by the mellow glow of neon bar signs and the cascade of yellow flowing down from streetlamps well past the hour of midnight. They sing about hearing the doggies howl and feeling the awful hot breath of the wolves breathing down their necks, but the feeling of being hunted or chased is just par for the course. It doesn't feel extraordinary, just something that has to be dealt with.
Lead singer Sean Spellman sings on "Wild Pack," "Some days I see the pretty things/But some nights I feel the pain love brings." It seems like such a statement could be applied much more frequently than just on "some days." It's most of the time and the pain that love brings is something that gathers, just like the firewood out back behind the shed and the empty beer cans in the garbage can.