Tired of immoral sensationalism on the tube, Johnson asks, “Where’d all the good people go?/ I’ve been changing the channels/I don’t see them on the TV shows” (“Good People”). The cautionary tale “Staple It Together” warns slaves of “to do” lists to reorder their priorities or miss out on life. Songs yearn for the blissful simplicity of escaping life’s fast lane (“Breakdown”) and hearing a dad spin stories about the stars (“Constellations”). Upon losing a friend, the singer takes comfort in the fact that death makes room for new life on “If I Could” (“One goes out, one comes in”). Talking through conflict is preferable to war (“Crying Shame”). A guy “Sitting, Waiting, Wishing” for a woman to return his love discovers a sad truth: “Loving somebody don’t make them love you.” Honesty is crucial to romance on “No Other Way.”
A line on “Do You Remember” has a man reflecting on the years he and his wife lived together before marrying. Johnson says we can “Never Know” the answers to life’s deep questions and downplays our significance in the cosmos (“We’re moments just combusting”).
Begging for a hammock and a cold lemonade, In Between Dreams is a mellow, generally worry-free departure into whimsical navel-gazing.
