What does Far Behind mean?

Candlebox: Far Behind Meaning

Tagged: Suicide [suggest]
Album cover for Far Behind album cover

Song Released: 1994


Far Behind Lyrics

Now maybe
I didn't mean to treat you bad
But I did it anyway
And then maybe
Some would say your life was sad
But you lived it anyway
And so maybe
Your friends they stand around they watch you crumble
As you falter to the ground
And then...

  1. 1TOP RATED

    #1 top rated interpretation:
    anonymous
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    Jul 9th 2007 !⃝

    On July 17, 1997, my son took his own life. He was not into (heavy) drugs. Some of his friends smoked pot and he may have as well. But all his friends and family knew him as a friendly, loving young man. He was born January 17, 1979. No one could understand, "why?" I suppose those left behind rarely understand "why." One day when the leaves are brushed aside for the last time, I will know and understand. About 2 months after his death, I found the lyrics to this song handwritten on notepaper in my other son's room (he's 2 years younger). They were very close and had most of the same friends. I had never heard the song. I hear it often now and I think of both my sons and their relationship.

  2. 2TOP RATED

    #2 top rated interpretation:
    username
    click a star to vote
    Jul 8th 2005 !⃝

    This is an excellent song. It's about losing a friend to alcholism or drug use. The singer is telling his friend how he wants to help him with his addictions but it hurts to see someone you love dying and pushing them away.

  3. 3TOP RATED

    #3 top rated interpretation:
    stacilynfortin
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    Jul 10th 2012 !⃝

    In 2009 my only daughter took her own life. The only things she had on her at the time were her phone and the printed lyrics to the song Far Behind. That was her suicide note to me. I carried that piece of paper with the lyrics in my bra right over my heart for over a year. I have always wondered what she was trying to tell me now I know. I had a very bad drug addiction and even though she was on the honor role and held down a job the pain I.side her was too much to bear so she was called home. I thank you for helping me understand what she was trying to tell me. I have always loved the song and her and I used to sing it together. Thank you I really needed to know what she was trying to tell me. R.I.P. Alyssa Jo momma Loves you

  4. anonymous
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    Apr 23rd 2023 !⃝

    In 1983, Adam Martin discovered that the knowledge of in constant pursuit of apple pie and a 78 Buick Skylark and written in stone
    would be why everybody would die but a tree squirrel would be why everybady would live past this due date of the appendix, heart and lungs.

  5. anonymous
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    Jun 17th 2020 !⃝

    This song breaks my heart every time I listen, but sometimes I will put it on repeat just to feel SOMETHING. My best friend took her own life in 2011. She fell into a drug addiction & deep depression & I never knew how bad it really got, because she was the one always trying to make me smile. I was the last one to see her. She begged me to stay the night with her & I couldn't because I had to work the next morning. The next day she was gone and I have carried so much guilt with me since that day. I interpret this song as us singing this song to each other. Because I really think she needed me so badly that night, & I didn't stay. I'll never stop loving her.

  6. Sugarray
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    Oct 12th 2019 !⃝

    I’m dealing with ex , now friends that has been addicted to coke and meth for 30+ years. She works and is a good person. I’m so saddened that I can’t get through to her to just STOP using. I listen to Far Behind everyday, sometimes over and over. I cry then feel relaxed. I doesn’t last though. I love her so.

  7. anonymous
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    May 22nd 2018 !⃝

    When a sibling is an addict all their life you are burdened with always taking care of them and fixing everything they break.. all the while they lie and steal from even you. Sometimes you treat them bad because you're so sick and tired of it. Then they OD and die and you never expected it. And you're left with guilt regret and you're all alone.

  8. anonymous
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    Oct 5th 2017 !⃝

    I play this song when I need a good angry cry.
    It reminds me of all the misery I brought onto myself during those years addicted to heroin.
    How it had me so detached from living that I was no more then a zombie wading through life looking for my next fix.
    Destroying everything in my path until one day after I overdosed at the wheel taking out a light pole waking up in the hospital handcuffed to the bed, did I realize I cannot do it anymore.
    That night I languished on the floor of my cell begging God to please help me. Sick from no dope, sick from all the things I did during my addiction career, sick from all the people I hurt, memories flooding my mind like a kick in the stomach, guilt and shame washing over me in waves, spiritually wasted and in so much pain I didn't wish for anything more then relief from my own self induced torment.
    The only thing I could think to make it stop was to just stop breathing.
    At that moment I was encapsulated with feelings of hope and the words but in feeling, that this too shall pass. Just hold on for the next minute, the next hour, the next day that there are people who need me. My life had worth.
    Get up and be the soldier you are. The soldier I made you to be. My plans are not done for you. You have much to do.
    And right then and there I swore I would make everything right.
    Here I am 11 years later. I wouldn't say my life is perfect but I am happy. And I know with out a doubt we all have a purpose. And all life is valuable. Even my life.

  9. anonymous
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    Feb 10th 2017 !⃝

    This song is about heroin addiction. He's saying that he didn't mean to treat his family and friends bad but the addiction had a hold of him. So he did it anyway. People were telling him that his life was sad and meaningless. But he still did the drugs. He lived it anyways. Despite what others were telling him. His friends were watching him suffer through this addiction. Watching him kill himself. And "but u left me far behind" simply means that the family and friends had to eventually disown him and cut him off due to his addiction.

  10. anonymous
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    Apr 1st 2013 !⃝

    In a 1994 interview with Playgirl, Candlebox frontman Kevin Martin stated that it was inspired by two friends who overdosed on heroin and "represents the loss of love between friends and having to be left with the feeling of emptiness."[1] He elaborated in a 2008 interview:

    "I wrote 'Far Behind' for Andy Wood. I was a huge Malfunkshun fan and a huge Mother Love Bone fan and I got to know Andy early on in his career when I was working in a shoe store with Susan Silver who was managing Mother Love Bone, Soundgarden, and Alice in Chains."[2]

  11. anonymous
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    Aug 31st 2012 !⃝

    I was blessed to see them in the early 90's in Tampa FL. This song completely relates to my best friend from high school that was going in the wrong direction and addicted to drugs. We lost touch for a while, however she had a child and we reconnected, she got it together, but I was not there enough for her earlier, I had moved away. She, as her mother when she was very young, died in a horrible car accident. I had just moved back to Tampa and did not see her yet. She was from Bartow, FL. Her name is Kim Sterling. I will never forget her and see her in heaven one day. She did find her faith before she died which I did soon before as well and we talked for hours on the phone while I still lived in Jax. I have dreams about her. But this song is so about her to me, she had a hard life, mother addicted, father who did not care and an addiction as well. I wish I had been more mature and could have helped her with that at the time. But she is always in my heart and dreams. I cannot hear this song without tears for missing her. Kim, you are my baby girl and always my best friend, see you in Heaven with Jesus one day, love you. We will ride our horses together again like the old days.

  12. anonymous
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    Aug 31st 2012 !⃝

    This song brings back alot of heartache and at times a smile to my face...I was in a abusive relationship and it was very bad, my husband was addicted to Meth and everything U could think of, it was a marriage of hell and very thankful my 3 children and I got out alive and right now I am married...again for 2 years...took me 10 years to get over the fear that everyone is not like him and you gotta trust and love again. With the LORD by my side...I know that he was there with me and now have a better life and live out of state...Bless U all!!
    Everytime I hear the song I play it loud and cry and thank the Lord.

  13. kandie
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    Jun 6th 2012 !⃝

    This song to be, is about none other then myself..he could not have made me feel anymore like he directly wrote this about me and to me and this is why.. I first heard this tune about half a year ago...it was the day my ex went back to jail for theift and meth charges, which was two days after he drove me to a field and brutaly attacked me, nearly ending my life..to this day that man still holds my heart, unconditional love i guess. "Now maybe i didnt mean to treat you bad but i did it anyway" would be nearly the exact words he later told me. "And maybe some would say your life was sad but you lived it anyway" are perfect words to describe my life in the eyes of anyone but myself. " now maybe Your friends they stand around and watch you crumble as your falter to the ground, and then someday your friends they stand beside as you were flying oh you were flying oh so high" relates to the time in my life when i began using meth hevily, and my good friends and family just walked away to let me ruin myself and i entered a whole new group of friends that just stood by and helped me to ruin myself. "but then someday people look at you for what they call your own they watch you suffer ya they hear you calling home but then someday we can take the time to brush the leaves aside so you can reach us hey but you left me far behind." is exactly what i felt was happening when my family finally accepted me back after seven long years of no contact..i did not want to find the time to brush the leaves aside because they had abandoned me in my worst times...i truly felt left far behind living on the streets.."now maybe i could have made my own mistakes but i live with what i known" is how i learn. i have to physically go through the bad choices for it to affect me. "now maybe we might share in something great oh wont you look at where were from oh wont you look at where we grown" relates back to my ex...he tried to end my life and i still wanted to share a great drug free life with him and absoluty still do. "but tgen some day comes tomorrow holds a sence for what i fear for you in my mind as you trip the final line" also relates back to my ex...i fear everyday we physically fight that he is going to go over board and i am no longer going to have a life which relates to "that cold day when you lost control its a shame you left my life so soon you should have told me..but you left me far behind" the cold day when my ex looses control my family will feel it was a shame i left there life so soon..they might even wish i had told them even tho in reality i did n they turned a blind eye n left me far behind....

    Id like to now say since the previous jail sentence this is no longer my life. Im still with him yes, but without all that crime n meth controling us, we live normal to what society looks as normal as. We work, we sleep, we get baked n we enjoy eachother...after it was lost forgotten and destroyed we finally found n rebuilt what made us, us.

    The last thing i say is never underestamate what a child or young adult has lived through, after all...i am only 20.

  14. anonymous
    click a star to vote
    May 6th 2012 !⃝

    I'm a cripple and it reminds me of when I first got injured and got left behind in the world by my so called friends.

  15. reed1218
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    Jan 2nd 2012 !⃝

    This song was my husbands favorite song and I never really knew why until it all happened to us. He began using and after time, like most users, he began to push everyone that wasn't using and everyone that was good for him away, including me. "didn't mean to treat you bad" - not that he actually treated him bad but in the users eyes they feel like they've been betrayed and use that to make you feel your own personal guilt for not knowing what to do or doing enough. Your "friends" will stand around and watch you crumble while you're flying high - a person on drugs while everyone around them now sits there and watches their life go to waste. He's telling the user that I'm still here and willing to help but you "have to brush the leaves aside" and let me help you. He's saying he is still here to help but he can't sit around and watch it all happen - "couldn't watch you suffer." This is his final plea telling him I'm here when you're ready for help but you have to come get it and I won't sit around and watch you "trip the final line."

  16. anonymous
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    Dec 10th 2011 !⃝

    ok people its definatly a song written about andrew wood the lead singer of motherlovebone who died of a heroin overdose. the singer of candlebox kevin martin has stated this in interviews in the past.

  17. anonymous
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    Jul 7th 2011 !⃝

    "Far Behind" is one of a few hit 1990s singles written in tribute to the late singer Andrew Wood. In a 1994 interview with Playgirl, Candlebox frontman Kevin Martin stated that it was inspired by two friends who overdosed on heroin and "represents the loss of love between friends and having to be left with the feeling of emptiness. Martin elaborated in a 2008 interview:

    "I wrote 'Far Behind' for Andy Wood. I was a huge Malfunkshun fan and a huge Mother Love Bone fan and I got to know Andy early on in his career when I was working in a shoe store with Susan Silver who was managing Mother Love Bone, Soundgarden, and Alice in Chains."

  18. anonymous
    click a star to vote
    Apr 24th 2011 !⃝

    The song is dedicated to the memory of Andrew Wood, who was the lead singer of Mother Love Bone. He died after an overdose of heroin left him on life support. He was a big influence on the Seattle music scene at the time and many critics have said that if he had not died that Mother Love Bone might have been the big break out band from the area and not Nirvana. As I noted earlier, the song is dedicated to him, but not necessarily about him, although the lyrics do fit nicely.

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