Nick Jonas isn’t waiting to team up again with his brothers these days. His latest song, “Spaceman,” is the title track from his new solo album of the same name. And it’s a track that speaks to the feelings of loneliness brought to light by COVID-19 and a long 2020.
Nick recognizes that living in too much isolation from other people is detrimental to our mental health (’Cause the numbers are high but we keep goin’ down/’Cause we ain’t supposed to live with nobody around”), and he believes that community is always better.
Nick isn’t optimistic about the current state of things in society (“They say it’s a phase, it’ll change if we vote/And I pray that it will, but I know that it won’t”), but he hangs on the hope and presses on anyway (“Hard times make you love the view/Right now think I’m getting through/Only way that I can”).
Nick realizes that isolation is unhealthy and recognizes that it has driven him toward some unhealthy habits, including the temptation to drink: “TV tells me what to think/Bad news, maybe, I should drink.” Ambiguous, somewhat ominous lyrics elsewhere in the song tell us, “Keep on thinking that we’re close/No drugs still overdose.”
The song’s video, which imagines Jonas as a lonely astronaut stranded on a barren planet, includes multiple shots of him shirtless.
How do we respond to loneliness, to feeling cut off relationally from others? “Spaceman” seems to recognize that ongoing isolation, brought about in part by coronavirus quarantines, isn’t healthy.
That said, the overall feel here isn’t really one of hope, either. Nick Jonas seems sadly resigned to believe that things will never change and that loneliness might be a forever state of being.
Kristin Smith joined the Plugged In team in 2017. Formerly a Spanish and English teacher, Kristin loves reading literature and eating authentic Mexican tacos. She and her husband, Eddy, love raising their children Judah and Selah. Kristin also has a deep affection for coffee, music, her dog (Cali) and cat (Aslan).
