“Parade” by Kevin Morby is a profound meditation on death, legacy, and the public nature of an artist’s life. Featured as the seventh track on his 2014 album Still Life, the song uses the powerful metaphor of a parade to explore the “masquerade” of existence and the ultimate desire to be remembered authentically.
This article will provide a detailed, in-depth analysis of every section of “Parade.” We will explore the song’s central themes, its connection to the album Still Life, and the real-world events and people who likely inspired its creation. This is a journey into one of Kevin Morby’s most haunting and beautiful compositions.
The Context: A Still Life in a Moving World
To understand “Parade,” we must first look at the album it comes from, Still Life. Released in 2014, this was Morby’s second solo album, written after he moved from New York City to Los Angeles.
The album’s title itself is a key to its meaning. It refers to the idea of being “still” and observant while the chaotic “life” of a new city swirls around. Morby was watching the world go by, and this perspective of a detached observer is central to the album’s themes.
Still Life deals heavily with mortality, change, and the passage of time. Songs on the album paint pictures of characters and moments, capturing them like a photograph or a painting. “Parade” sits in the heart of this album, acting as its emotional centerpiece.
The song perfectly encapsulates the album’s title. It examines the “still life” of a body after death, but presents it as part of a moving, public spectacle. This tension between stillness and motion, private and public, defines the entire song.
The Central Metaphor: What is the “Parade”?
The song’s entire meaning hinges on its title image. The “parade” is a complex symbol with several layers of meaning. At its most direct, it represents a funeral procession.
It is not a quiet, private burial. It is a public event, a spectacle with onlookers. The speaker’s final wish is to have his “body on display,” making his death a form of public performance.
This image is powerful. It suggests a life lived in the public eye. For an artist like Morby, life itself can feel like a performance, a “masquerade.” It’s only logical that death would be the final performance in this parade.
But the parade is also a metaphor for life itself. We are all marching through town, passing by onlookers, and eventually leaving. The song suggests this journey is a “grey charade,” a puppet show where we are not always in control.
The “parade” is therefore both the procession of life and the procession of death. It is the spectacle we create while we are alive and the spectacle that is made of us when we are gone.
Section 1: The Journey of the Seeker
The song opens not with the parade, but with a dedication to a seeker. The first verse addresses someone who has “come to find out who you are.” This sets a philosophical tone for the entire piece.
Morby wishes this person luck on their journey of self-discovery. He knows it is a difficult path. The song acts as a blessing for those who are searching.
The search is not just for identity. The seeker is also looking for “what is lost.” This could be lost innocence, a lost love, or a lost sense of purpose. The song emphasizes the high stakes of this quest, urging the seeker to find it “at any cost.”
This opening verse also introduces the theme of vulnerability and transformation. It speaks to someone who has traveled from “far” and someone who is “so soft.”
There is a warning in these lines. The world can be a harmful place for a soft-hearted traveler. The song predicts a necessary change: “You may look up one day and you’ll be hard.” This is the price of the journey, the cost of survival.
This first verse creates a connection between the listener and the song. We are all, in some way, the seeker on this journey. The song acknowledges our shared search before it confronts its main topic: the end of that search.
Section 2: Confronting the “Masquerade”
The chorus is where the song’s central thesis is revealed. It is a stark, honest confrontation with mortality. The speaker speculates about his own sudden death: “If I were to die today.”
He doesn’t imagine a peaceful passing. He imagines being “slaughtered in that masquerade.” This is a key phrase. The “masquerade” is life, the public performance, the social facade we all wear.
The speaker feels that this performance is inauthentic, a “charade.” He feels like a “puppet” in the show. His death, in this context, is not a tragedy but a release from the performance.
His final words are not of fear or regret. They are a command: “Put my body on display in the parade.” This is a radical acceptance of the spectacle.
If life is a show, then death must be the grand finale. The speaker doesn’t want to hide. He wants his physical self to be part of the final act.
This desire is both shocking and deeply human. It is a wish to be seen, to be acknowledged, and to control the narrative of one’s own end.
The imagery of the parade itself is vividly described. The speaker’s body is “passing slowly through the town.” This is a classic image of a funeral cortege, like a New Orleans jazz funeral.
A key detail is that his “feet, they cannot touch the ground.” This has a literal meaning: he is being carried in a coffin or on a float.
But it also has a profound metaphorical meaning. In death, he is finally detached from the earth. He is no longer walking in the “parade” of life but is now floating above it, an object of observation. He has become, literally, a “still life.”
Section 3: The Variations in Death’s Display
The song’s chorus repeats, but with a crucial change. The second time, the speaker’s final wish is to be “buried in different shades.”
This is a beautiful and poetic request. It contrasts with the “grey charade” he mentioned earlier. If the charade of life is dull and uniform, his death should be the opposite.
To be buried “in different shades” means to be remembered in all his complexity. He does not want to be remembered as a simple, one-dimensional “puppet.”
He wants his flaws, his virtues, his contradictions—all the “shades” of his personality—to be acknowledged. This is a plea for an honest legacy.
This second chorus also adds a sense of finality. The speaker asks a question: “Go now, you’ll go but, oh, just how?” This is the question we all face: how will we leave?
The answer is final and inescapable. “Never leave this, never leave this town of the parade.” This line is chilling. It suggests that even in death, we are trapped.
We are trapped in the “town” of memory. We are trapped in the “parade” of how others remember us. Our legacy becomes its own kind of prison. We can never truly leave.
Section 4: The Community of Friends
After the dark reflections of the chorus, the second verse shifts focus. It becomes personal and intimate. The speaker, imagining his death, sees who is there waiting for him: “All of my friends were there.”
He then names specific people. “Laurie was there, waiting on me. Anna was there, waiting on me.” This grounding in real names is a powerful shift from the abstract “masquerade.”
This is where external research becomes critical. Who are Laurie and Anna? Many fans and critics believe “Laurie” is a reference to Laurie Anderson, the avant-garde artist and musician.
Laurie Anderson was the partner of rock icon Lou Reed, one of Morby’s musical heroes. Lou Reed passed away in October 2013, less than a year before Still Life was released.
If “Laurie” is Laurie Anderson, then this song could be Morby processing the death of his idol, Lou Reed. He is imagining the community that gathers when a great artist passes. He is placing himself within that lineage.
“Anna” is widely believed to be Anna St. Louis, a fellow musician and friend of Kevin Morby’s. By naming her, he brings the song from the level of idols to the level of his personal circle.
This verse is about the power of community. In the end, the “masquerade” and the “parade” fade. What matters are the “friends… waiting on me.”
The verse concludes with a simple, profound statement: “I have come, I will go, just the same.” This is the ultimate acceptance of his mortality. He is a visitor, a traveler, just like the seeker in the first verse.
His time is temporary. But his arrival and his departure are marked and witnessed by his friends. This is what gives the “parade” its human meaning.
Section 5: The “Island of Misfit Toys”
The song ends with a dramatic shift. The music quiets, and Morby enters a spoken-word section that unlocks the song’s final layer of meaning.
This outro is a stream of consciousness. It contains a direct reference: “Still life with the rejects from the Island of Misfit Toys.”
This is a nod to the 1964 Christmas special Rudolph the Red-Nosed Reindeer. The Island of Misfit Toys is the place where all the broken and unwanted toys go.
This reference is the key to the entire album and song. Morby is identifying himself and his community of artists as “rejects” from the mainstream world.
They are the “misfit toys.” The “still life” of the album title is their life. It’s a life lived on the margins, with other outcasts.
This re-frames the entire song. The “parade” is not just a funeral; it’s a celebration of the misfits. The “masquerade” is the “normal” world they don’t belong to.
The speaker’s death is not just an individual’s end; it’s the passing of one of these “rejects.” He wants his body on display as a final act of defiance, a testament to the “misfit” life he lived.
The spoken-word section also includes a sudden, romantic image. He talks of a “boy” who wants to “open up your window” and “climb it anywhere.” This is a reference to Rapunzel, a fairy tale.
This romantic longing seems out of place, but it’s not. It’s the counter-balance to all the darkness. It is the life force, the search for connection and love, that exists even within the “masquerade.”
It is the longing of the “boy,” the “misfit toy,” who just wants to find “somebody just like you.” This raw, vulnerable plea for connection is the human heart beating beneath the death-obsessed surface of the song.
It’s a longing for a connection so strong it can transcend the “parade” and the “town” and the “charade.”
Conclusion: A Legacy in “Different Shades”
“Parade” by Kevin Morby is a masterpiece of modern folk-rock. It operates on many levels, from a personal reflection on mortality to a grand statement about the life of an artist.
The song paints a picture of life as a “masquerade” and a “parade,” a public performance that is often inauthentic. The speaker feels like a “puppet” in this performance.
In the face of this, he confronts his own death. He chooses not to hide but to make his death the final, most authentic part of his performance.
He wishes to be put “on display,” but not as a simple object. He wants to be remembered in all his “different shades,” a complex and “misfit” individual.
The song is ultimately a plea for an honest legacy. It is a tribute to the community of “rejects” and “misfit toys” who make art.
And it is a recognition that, while we are all just passing through (“I have come, I will go”), the connections we make with our “friends” are the only things that are real.
“Parade” is a haunting, beautiful, and deeply complex song. It asks the listener to consider their own “parade” and what kind of legacy they will leave behind in this “town” that we can never truly leave.