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Not Tonight

Description:

This is a song that Sara Quin wrote and that appeared on the album If It Was You. Sara sings the lead vocals and Tegan sings the background vocals.

Lyrics:

Love, pull your sore ribs in

I will pull your tangles out

In the back of your car I feel like

I have travelled nowhere

What will bring me home?

What will make me stay, stay?

What will bring me home?

What will make me stay, stay?

Well I don’t know, I don’t know hoo ooh

I don’t know, I don’t know hoo ooh

Everything in my body says not tonight

Everything in my body says no

Everything in my body says not tonight

Everything in my body says no

What will bring me home?

What will make me stay, stay?

What will bring me home?

What will make me stay, stay?

Well I don’t know, I don’t know hoo ooh

I don’t know, I don’t know hoo ooh

Live Performances:

YouTube playlist


July 15, 2003 (Video)

July 17, 2004 (Video)

Trivia and Quotes:

  • In some live performances of this song from 2012-2013, Sara sang this song as a mashup with the song I'm On Fire by Bruce Springsteen.

  • This song was inspired by The Hotel New Hampshire by John Irving.


"The most obvious time that I was using reading in my songwriting was on [2002’s third album] If It Was You. I was reading a lot of John Irving. I was particularly obsessed with The Hotel New Hampshire and I ended up writing a song called “Not Tonight.” I was thinking a lot about that book and one of the characters. Obviously I wasn’t writing it necessarily about that character but I was thinking about the character and it was one of the first times that I started to very naturally take two of my interests and use them to inspire each other." - Sara in 2014

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