Plans is all about heartbreak. The album title itself is pointed: no adjective is needed because only when a plan fails does it remain a plan. The songs poetically describe the different ways love ends, including the end of summer, the slow demise of a long-term relationship, and of course, death.
“What Sarah Said” is peak identity for a band called Death Cab for Cutie. Crooning about death runs the risk of feeling manipulative or overly sentimental, but multiple elements make it work here. The first is its presence on Plans, which has a theme of sadness, and its placement near the end. Going in order, you’ve already heard songs about following love “into the dark”, leaving love “in our summer skin”, and sleeping back-to-back “like brothers on a hotel bed”. By the time you reach “What Sarah Said”, the mood is solid melancholy.
The lyrics also have a part in landing the emotion. Written as the singer’s reflection during a deathbed visit, they show rather than tell. Beginning with the insight about plans, the song goes on to describe details of the hospital. On first hearing, it can take a minute to realize what’s happening. This goes with the circumspect feeling of loss, of avoiding it by thinking about details before finally confronting it and saying it out loud.
And it came to me then
That every plan
Is a tiny prayer to father timeAs I stared at my shoes
In the ICU
That reeked of piss and 409And I rationed my breaths
As I said to myself
That I’d already taken too much todayAs each descending peak
On the LCD
Took you a little farther away from me
Away from me
Finally, the music itself is committed to the concept. The time signature is 12/8, but rather than using it for a romantic or upbeat feeling, the band use it to create a meditative undulation. The meditation continues until the song crescendoes (diminuendos?) with what Sarah said: “Love is watching someone die”. After a quiet beat, the song continues to ask “So who’s gonna watch you die?” The music and rhythm convey the process of dying. The undulating rhythm of music and vocals are reminiscent of EEGs and EKGs, and they slow before stopping.
The “you” of the song is open to interpretation. My take is that the “you” who is dying is also the “you” being referred to at the end. The singer and the dying are former lovers. At the end of their relationship, the singer referenced what Sarah said and broke up by saying, “So who’s gonna watch you die?” Now that the former lover is dying, the words haunt the singer, who is also left asking the question of himself.
KEXP also has an incredible live version.
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