Don’t go back to Rockville

“(Don’t Go Back To) Rockville” was the second and final single released by REM from their album ‘Reckoning’. The song was a plea to Mike Mills’ girlfriend not to return to her hometown. It was released in June, 1984.

It was a song that I put on high rotation when I was in my last year of high school in country Victoria. I really, really wanted a good year 12 score so I could study in Melbourne. (I don’t think I even cared that much what I was going to study.)

The song seems to make sense again, now, but maybe for different reasons. Songs will do that.

Don’t Go Back To Rockville
“Looking at your watch a third time waiting in the station for the bus
Going to a place that’s far, so far away and if that’s not enough
Going where nobody says hello, they don’t talk to anybody they don’t know
You’ll wind up in some factory that’s full time filth and nowhere left to go
Walk home to an empty house, sit around all by yourself
I know it might sound strange, but I believe
You’ll be coming back before too long

(chorus)
Don’t go back to Rockville, don’t go back to Rockville, don’t go back to Rockville
And waste another year

At night I drink myself to sleep and pretend
I don’t care that you’re not here with me
‘Cause it’s so much easier to handle
All my problems if I’m too far out to sea
But something better happen soon
Or it’s gonna be too late to bring you back

(repeat chorus)

It’s not as though I really need you
If you were here I’d only bleed you
But everybody else in town only wants to bring you down and
That’s not how it ought to be
Well I know it might sound strange, but I believe
You’ll be coming back before too long”

(repeat chorus 2x)