Phish.net > Charts > Narration Chart: "Harpua", 2003-07-29

TREY: Well, you’ve all heard many, many stories about our good friend Jimmy. But, there’s one story… that is thus yet untold. This is a good one. Because, what happened was later in Jimmy’s life after all the experiences with all the Elvises and the mental rollercoasters and everything, what happened was he found himself, as many of us do directionless and listless… Jimmy, for those of you who don’t know, Jimmy is a young boy who lives with his cat and with his dog, Harpua, and his cat…

FISH: Poster Nutbag.

TREY: Yes. Anyway. This is the story of Jimmy later in his life. He has had lots of adventures. He comes home, he finds himself in his room, and he’s, you know, he’s bored. He finds that his life has no meaning. He’s searching for meaning in his life. Take it down a little bit... So, you know, he doesn’t know where to turn. What he feels is that he has everything in his life, he has love with his cat and his dog, but he’s alone. What he feels is that he doesn’t have, he’s searching, he’s searching for It is what he’s searching for.

FISH: He has everything but IT.

TREY: So he thinks "How can I find IT?" He’s, you know, he’s sitting there and he thinks, you know, it could be this or it could be that. He realizes that he is going to have to leave and go on an adventure to find IT. So, the first thing he does is he packs up Harpua and Poster Nutbag, and he gets out in his rusty ole pickup truck. He thinks that maybe he can find it by going on the road, traveling down the road and just searching randomly. He’s driving along in his car, and he’s got his little, his little acoustic guitar, and he pulls over. He sits there, and he’s feeling a little blue. The first thing he does he starts, he looks over at Harpua and he decides to sing him a little sad song:

[“Bittersweet Motel”]

TREY: So, it goes without saying when you hear Jimmy sitting in his car, his ole pick up truck playing "Bittersweet Motel" for just his dog, nobody else to listen, he realized he has not found IT. He’s getting a little, you know, life has ceased to have much meaning. So, he decides that the best thing for him, the best solution to find meaning in his life, he decides that he will join a rock band. So, he joins a rock band and goes on the road. He looks surprisingly, just in case you never knew what Jimmy looked like he looks a lot like this… [motions to Fish]

So he goes out and he finds a couple of friends, and he gets together in a rock band. He goes on the road, and he starts thinking that maybe he is on the road to finding IT. Despite the fact that he wears a silly little dress and everything, he finds that there is plenty of IT on the road. IT is coming to him every night. He is meeting IT. IT is incredible. He thinks he is meeting IT until it gets to the point where people in the parking lot are making stickers that say “Jimmy Hit On Me.” But, anyways that's a whole different story. So, he goes through a couple of years on the road thinking he has found IT. But, suddenly he finds himself listless again. He realizes that you know that that that he once again has not found meaning, and that that he needs something even more than what he was chasing on the road.

One day he is sitting there, and then and then IT happens. He finds the meaning of life. Fish why don’t you come out and sing a little song that explains what happened to Jimmy.

FISH: This is what happened to Jimmy. [Performs “Fooled Around and Fell in Love” including vacuum solo] Yes I did. That’s what Jimmy did. He fooled around. He fooled around and then basically God handed him a little girl and his big girl and maybe another 10 girls or something. Maybe more, who knows? That’s where Jimmy’s at these days. [Band plays “HYHU”]

TREY: And then just when Jimmy found love, life came up and bit him on the ass again...