Three Sheets to Kishkiyya · Track 21 · middle
Pie-Eyed
VOLUME I — being gloriously, world-tilting DRUNK (the night at full tilt). The idiom and the song's title hook: "Pie-Eyed". Its true history: US, c.1904 — eyes wide and blank as the top of a pie, unfocused and cross-eyed from drink. Render this beat of the night as the band's affectionate, funny, celebratory tribute — the idiom itself is the chorus hook.
Lyrics
[Intro] Look at her sitting there, an absolute queen Staring at nothing, the grandest I've seen! [Verse 1] The chandelier is swinging, though the ceiling is completely still She’s trying to focus on a water glass, an impossible mountain to conquer It takes a special kind of magic, a magnificent lack of will To look at a bartender and see a very blurry sponsor Oh, the magnificent wobble of the chin! [Chorus] She is pie-eyed, gloriously pie-eyed! Straight out of 1904, an American dream Eyes wide and blank as a bakery crust, floating on a cider stream Not a single thought behind that beautiful glaze Lost in the cross-eyed, wonderful haze Pie-eyed, my darlings, she has left the earthly plane! [Verse 2] If you wave a hand before her face, she doesn't even blink She is communing with the spirits, or at least the ones she drank The room is spinning like a carousel, painted gold and pink And her mind is a vault that was emptied out, a very happy bank It’s a tragedy! It’s a triumph! A one-woman parade! [Chorus] She is pie-eyed, gloriously pie-eyed! Straight out of 1904, an American dream Eyes wide and blank as a bakery crust, floating on a cider stream Not a single thought behind that beautiful glaze Lost in the cross-eyed, wonderful haze Pie-eyed, my darlings, she has left the earthly plane! [Bridge] We are looking at the top of an apple tart Round and flat and empty, bless her little heart She’s seeing double, maybe triple, what a fascinating state A theatrical masterpiece right here on her dinner plate! [Outro] So raise the curtain for the blankest stare in town She’s going up, even as she’s falling down Pie-eyed and perfect. I think she just winked, wait, no, that’s a twitch.