Quarantine and Chill

Track nine on Masks and Monsters, feat. Babidi (Taylor James / J MESA). Co-written and performed with Luke Francis Walton, North Park lockdown, August 2020. Same collaborator orbit as Dragon Ball $d, $WAMI$, and later Hold Up on Big Hug: a cartoon-era feature voice on the pandemic record.

It plays as a phone check-in, the distance call as lifeline, with safety and sanity both in question (wondering if you found a place that was safe, feeling crazy, I know). The hook makes the meme title sincere, rewriting Netflix and chill into survival instruction: gotta chill through the quarantine. The bridge defers the reunion with a promise and a self-aware punchline (when this is over, I’m running back to you, what’d you think that I say), and widens past the couple to collective grief: feeling all the people, feeling misery.

Less character-comedy than Flip Flop Phil, less PSA than Wash Your Fucking Hands. Babidi brings collaborator warmth back into the LP after eight Luke-alone tracks. Pairs with Snuggle With Shaggy as the voice-on-the-line version. Next on the album: My Mind Is Slowly Slipping, the second Babidi co-write here.

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Calling
Checking in to see
How you're doing today

Your voice makes me sing

I'm just calling
Wondering if you found a place
That was safe
Feeling crazy
I know

Every day is a mystery
Don't know what you're gonna do
How we're gonna live this way

Through the sickness
And the social pain
Of the quarantine

Ooo
Gotta chill
Gotta chill
Through the quarantine

Call me back
When you know
That when this is over
I'm running back to you

What'd you think that I say

Every day is a mystery
Don't know what you're gonna do
How we gonna live this way

Feeling all the people
Feeling misery
But through the sickness
And the social pain
Of the quarantine
Quarantine