On the surface this is a music post, but it really isn’t. It’s about human emotion and feelings. Before I get to that…

I wanted to point out that my wife and I have both been Journey fans for an exceptionally long time. She’s one of those teenage girls that grew up with Steve Perry at the height of his power in Journey, so anything that isn’t Steve Perry gets dismissed. I think she’s always blown off my opinion as to why my all time favorite Journey song is one by the incumbent vocalist, Arnel Pineda. I decided to put down into words WHY. Most of the words are Journey’s words, but it still fits…

OK, with that out of the way…

Journey has made a total of 7 albums and one EP of studio material without Perry. Arnel Pineda has made two albums with Journey (a third coming in early 2021). But there’s one track off their (still) most recent album (2011’s Eclipse) that I love more than any other. It’s called “Human Feel”, and the lyrics just touch me.

As embedded as I am in social media and online, I sometimes feel like I’ve lost myself, that I exist solely for online interactions – that the real world is an annoyance. So many of us are stuck on our screens, are stuck on likes, shares, retweets, and the names we see on Facebook, Twitter, or whatever. While my livelihood and paycheck come from these places, that both my work and hobby are in the same places means I spend a LOT of time there, so…

To that, I wanted to point out some of the lyrics. This snippet is the part that gets me the most – and is my actual profile text on my personal Twitter account.

“What I’m missing is true emotion,
I get lost in this digital ocean.
What I’m needing right now is Human Feel!”

But the whole song delves into that a bit more. Check these lyrics out, and think about one’s life being buried in all this online stuff..

In a jungle of hardware and mass frustration,
Overloaded with way too much information these days.
I’m needing more than the virtual world I’m seeing.
Could someone just let me talk to a live human being?

While automation and droids just keep on coming,
Wanna unplug right now, wanna just start running.
Caught up in the web as it weaves an illusion,
A network of lies that giant ball of confusion.

What I’m missing is true emotion,
I get lost in this digital ocean.
What I’m needing right now is human feel.
Can’t substitute love and passion.
Show me you care, baby show me reaction.
Coming straight from the heart, it’s human feel.

Rise up, find some compassion,
It’s not too late.
Don’t give up,
What you feel it still matters, don’t wait.

There’s technically more than that, but it’s mostly repeating – that’s the bulk of it.

I cannot stress how much I love this song, it’s probably Top 5 for me by any band, anywhere, of all time. I was reminded of this stuff as I sit here all day on Thanksgiving here in the US working shifts.

If you want to hear what the song is like, check this out: