Smug

[Image: 'Squint' Front Cover]

Sections:

Lyrics

Strike this little pose
Chin up in the air
Lips together tightly
Nostrils in a flare
Now look like you care
Very nice!

Practice in the mirror
Brushing back a tear
Very sincere
A promising career could begin right here at home
If you've got that smug
That smug

Hey mama, hey mama, lookee what your little babies all have become
Hey mama, hey mama, don't it ever make you wish you'd been a nun?

Vain and fickle, were we weaned on a pickle?
Is it in our blood?
Rome is burning
We're here turning smug

Strike another pose
Power politics
Swallow their conventions
Get your power fix
We love to mud wrestle
We love to be politically Koreshed

Practice that smug
Pose it like a man
One part Master Limbaugh
Two parts Madame Streisand
Now pretend you're in a band
My, my, we're looking smug
Very very very very

Hey mama, hey mama, lookee what your little babies all have become
Hey mama, hey mama, don't it ever make you wish you'd been a nun?

Vain and fickle, were we weaned on a pickle?
Is it in our blood?
Rome is burning
We're here turning smug

All you smug-starved millions in the thick of the search
Welcome to our church
Whatcha wanna solve?
We can help you evolve from merely self-righteous
To perfectly smug

Strike the proud pose of our country club brethren
Friendly as a tomb
Fragrant as the bottom of a locker-room broom
Now what's the matter?
Hey, get off your knees, that part don't come 'til later
God will not be pleased

Hey mama, hey mama, lookee what your little babies all have become
Hey mama, hey mama, don't it ever make you wish you'd been a nun?

Vain and fickle, were we weaned on a pickle?
Is it in our blood?
Rome is burning
We're here turning smug

Hey mama, hey mama, lookee what your little babies all have become
Hey mama, hey mama, don't it ever make you wish you'd been a nun?

Vain and fickle, were we weaned on a pickle?
Is it in our blood?
Rome is burning
We're here turning
Rome is cooking
My, we're looking smug

Recorded Appearances

Albums

Promos

Bootlegs

About The Song

From Squintlets, "The Lament..." promotional Squint CD, 1993:

Smug started as a song when I was channel surfing and the images of a certain Mr. Limbaugh and a certain Madame Streisand came in rapid succession. I just started thinking, "Man, this is what it's going to be. It's going to be everybody in their corners, beating their chests and acting arrogant, and maybe it's just gonna turn into some big mud wrestling match."

From InnerView: Steve Taylor, Visions Of Gray, November 1993:

DV: "Smug" has the barbs in it that I've come to expect from you, and I was glad to see it.

ST: [laughs] Oh yeah. Right, right. Ah, yes. "Smug" was um... Mighta been, mighta been flipping channels. I'm not sure where the original thing came from, but maybe flippin' channels, I think maybe thinkin' of Rush Limbaugh and Barbara Streisand in a wrestling match and they're just two different genders of the same thing.

Just that attitude that, you know, self-righteousness. IT used to be the church always got accused of that, but lately people from all persuasions are taking it and running with it, you know, society is becoming self- centered and very smug.

From The Flying Chicken, The Monkey Temple, The Cotton Castle, Campus Life, March 1994:

Arrogance and insincerity are the order of the day, from the personal to the political to the pulpit, while society continues to slide.

From Steve Taylor Interview, Listen In, August 2005:

"Smug" is a song that kind of has one gun pointed at the left and one gun pointed at the right. In fact, when you get to the extremes of either side, they're pretty much the same thing, and they're equally just as smug and self-righteous as the other is.

I think at that point the two people I picked on were Barbara Streisand and Rush Limbaugh, and as far as I'm concerned, they're identical people, they seem extremely self-absorbed and self-important, and it seems the exact opposite of the way Jesus taught us to live. The Bible talks a lot about how ugly pride is, and that's what that song is about.