Annotated lyrics for The Hold Steady song 'The Most Important Thing' - When the band played Sally Cinnamon. / It felt like 1991 again. / I didn't get into them too early in / But I still got into them. / Right now that seems like it's the most important thing. / That's the thing about Gideon. / He knows just a little bit about so many things. / Knows too much about certain things. / Knows some guys who know some Latin Kings. / Right now that seems like it's pretty much the only thing. / We're baby birds with broken wings and we sing. / We sing unity songs but the scene's still splintered. / We're stretched thin and we're stressed at the seams and we dream. / We dream like screens but it's still out of focus. / So we know it's just show biz, but it still seems to surprise us. / When they hook us by the mouth and pull us up / and then they try to fry us. / That's the thing about Charlemagne. / He got all washed up in the amber waves of grain. / Rubbed up on the bars on the bluff. / Got tangled up in the double dutch. / You know he drank too much. / He never really ate enough. / It was so so sad with Charly in his sick bed / He looked like hell and smelled like chemicals / Maxing out on medicine and feeling all invincible / ICU at Regions Hospital. / It felt so cool with Holly at the bus stop. / With that feeling coming through our arteries. / Running low on energy and nodding off in revelry. / Faded blues of Memphis Tennessee. / Mississippi River always holds it all together. / We sing unity songs but the scene's still splintered. / We're stretched thin and we're stressed at the seams and we dream. / We dream like screens but it's still out of focus. / Sure we know it's just show biz / Still seems to surprise us / When they hook us by the mouth and pull us up / and then they try to fry us. / We've done a pretty good job of frying ourselves I think. / Then she blows blasts of static into music from the big pink. / Stumbled into the foyer and pulled the bookshelf over. / And we were drowning in the literature. / Bram Stoker hit you head. / Ginsberg hit your dick. / A big black Bible hit your head. / And that's how we got born again.