coastal alt/indie rock

 

bubbles

​​Field Notes​​

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“Bubbles” is an example of a song written almost entirely because of a sound.

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I often buy new plugins or synthesizer emulations and then spend time experimenting with the sounds. In this case, I found one I really liked and started playing a keyboard riff with it. The software is Analog Labs 5, and the sound is called "Popping up and down" — if you listen to the song, you’ll recognize it immediately.

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It sounded - to me -  like bubbles rising through water.

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That sound gave me the first idea: bubbles. From there, the song became connected to the language of the COVID years as I was working on it in 2022. We had been sheltering in place, putting on masks and being told to stay inside our bubbles. If everyone in your bubble was healthy, you could remain there together. If you became sick, you were supposed to avoid carrying it outside.

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It was reasonable advice. But the idea of staying inside a bubble also reminded me of something I’d studied in high school: isolationism. A bubble can protect you, but it can also separate you from everyone else.

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But hey, I'm The Glenn Coast, so any bubble analogy has to include water, so the song begins with bubbles in their most literal sense:

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Bubbles rise from down below
Bubbles give us vertigo
Bubbles show us where to go
In the undertow

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I’ve always loved the water. I love swimming, snorkeling and the idea of exploring the deep. For several medical reasons—including the heart surgery I had as a new-born — I can’t scuba dive. But I studied it, and I was especially fascinated by cave diving.

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One of the dangers of cave diving is becoming completely disoriented. In the darkness, you may no longer know which direction leads to the surface. One of the simplest things you can do is release some air and watch where the bubbles travel. Bubbles rise. They show you which way is up.

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So when I wrote that bubbles “show us where to go,” it wasn’t just an image. Bubbles can offer direction. They surface. They carry oxygen. They tell us how and when we might float again.

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At first, everything about them seems positive.

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Then the song turns.

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In the “bubbles’ garden,” they protect us, hide us and deflect whatever threatens us. But they also shun, reject and neglect. Once we’re safely inside our own bubble, we may stop allowing anyone else to enter. Something created for protection can gradually become a form of isolation.

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The chorus sits in the middle of that tension:

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Can we lift above this rubble?
Can we dampen all these troubles?
While the noise around us seems to double
Can you and I stay in our bubbles?

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That was the question of the moment. Could we protect one another without retreating completely from one another? Could we create a safe space without turning it into a sealed world?

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“Bubbles” also taught me something important about The Glenn Coast. Some might assum that writing within the imagery of the coast would limit what I could write about. Instead, I began to understand that the ocean wasn’t a limitation. It was a language.

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Through it, I could write about fear, isolation, protection, society or almost anything else. A hundred songwriters could write a hundred different songs called “Bubbles.”

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This is the one that rose out of me at that particular moment.

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Lyrics

 

VERSE 1:

BUBBLES rise from down below

BUBBLES give us vertigo

BUBBLES show us where to go, 

in the undertow

BUBBLES surface now and then

BUBBLES carry oxygen

BUBBLES tell us how and when

we can float again

 

CHORUS:

[can we lift above this rubble?

can we dampen all these troubles?

while noise arounds us seems to double?

can you and i stay in our BUBBLES?

 

VERSE 2:

BUBBLES guard and they protect

BUBBLES hide and they deflect

BUBBLES shun and they reject

yeah they neglect

BUBBLES always start off strong

BUBBLES want to carry on

but BUBBLES never last for long

till they go wrong

​

CHORUS:

Details

• key: F

• tempo: 120

• time: 4/4

• year: 2022

• location(s): Monterey, California

• mood: electronica, paradox, fear

• theme: the cost of isolation

• instruments: synthesizer, electric 12-string guitars, bass, drums

• recording status: released

• registered: ℗ 2026, glenn cash hughes

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