The song “Give Me Novocain” by the band Green Day reveals a sense of suffering, and the use of drugs to help ease pain. The chorus “Drain the pressure from the swelling / This sensation’s over whelming/ Give me a long kiss goodnight and everything will be alright/ Tell me Jimmy I won’t feel a thing/ So give me Novocain.” This bluntly shows that what ever point of view this is coming from that person is very clearly suffering and is using drugs as a way to escape from it. The beat of the drums and the guitar is slow at first, then changes to a more up beat tone, hinting at the drugs raging through a person’s system. The slower beat that the song returns to is the high. It’s the calm that a person feels when the are worry free. When I first heard this song I had no reason to believe it was about anything than what was being obviously sung about. But when I listened to the lyrics it revealed the suffering that we as humans go through and what some people will do to escape, even if only for a matter of hours. It made me think about all the times I wished I could escape from something as simple as my mother. I changed my way of dealing with things from then on. Instead of wishing I could just get away by any means possible, or punching walls, I would just think about everything I have that is worth staying for. Everything I did both in thought and in action changed slightly. I never thought about wanting to run away or get at my mom and instead of hitting walls or slamming doors I sat down with some music and just thought about what had just happened. I became a less stressed person, and that is the best influence anything has had on my life
