What It's Like

Last updated
"What It's Like"
Everlast-WhatIt'sLike.jpg
Single by Everlast
from the album Whitey Ford Sings the Blues
B-side "7 Years"
ReleasedJuly 1998 (1998-07) [1]
Genre
Length
  • 5:03 (album version)
  • 4:37 (video version)
  • 3:50 (radio edit)
Label Tommy Boy
Songwriter(s) Everlast
Producer(s) Everlast
Everlast singles chronology
"The Rhythm"
(1990)
"What It's Like"
(1998)
"Painkillers"
(1998)
Audio sample
"What It's Like"

Structurally, the song consists of three verses, a chorus, and a bridge. The last line of the chorus varies according to the particular situation faced by the character in the preceding verse. Each character is sympathetically presented as a victim of circumstance and as being an object of derision. Each verse ends with the line God forbid you ever had to walk a mile in his/her shoes (in the third verse, "...you ever had to wake up to hear the news") and Cause then you really might know what it's like to, with the action varying depending on what the character has to do ("sing the blues," "have to choose," and "have to lose," respectively).

The characters are:

The speaker attempts to build empathy for each character's struggle through the phrase "God forbid you ever had to walk a mile in his/her shoes/Cause then you really might know what it's like". The third verse changes the angle slightly to focus on the family left behind: "Now his wife and his kids are caught in the midst of all of his pain/You know it comes that way, at least that's what they say when you play the game/God forbid you ever had to wake up to hear the news/Cause then you really might know what it's like to have to lose".

Music video

The music video was directed by Frank Sacramento in Los Angeles. Everlast is shown singing underwater while the three characters depicted in his song drown. Later they are crowded around a window (possibly dead) behind which an idyllic family is enjoying dinner, oblivious to the less fortunate outside.

Track listings

Charts

Release history

RegionDateFormat(s)Label(s)Ref.
United StatesJuly 1998 Modern rock radio Tommy Boy [1]
November 2, 1998 Active rock radio [41]
January 12, 1999 Contemporary hit radio [42]
United KingdomFebruary 15, 1999
  • 7-inch vinyl
  • CD
  • cassette
[43]

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