You Can’t Have It All

Song Notes

Mark said of the song during the recording of Twilight of the Innocents:

When Tim first played the basic idea for this I thought it was totally weird, but it’s probably now my favourite song on the whole album. The guitar has almost an Eastern European/Russian vibe to the repeating lead parts, the verse has a super groove going on that has a really cool distorted bass line. The arrangement is pretty far removed from what we’re usually up to. The chorus completely drops down to just a quiet guitar and lone vocal, repeating the title line along a very catchy melody. The middle section of the song has a really intense instrumental section, super drumming by our mini-Grohl and then it stays pretty full on, like a mash of Nirvana when they did pop and Weezer in their Blue album era. The chorus has such a hook and I think it’s a sure bet to be a fan and live favourite too. It took a few days to get it initially but it’s one of our best yet

Tim Wheeler said of the track in February 2007 prior to it’s release as a single:

It’s a bitchy love song, dealing with bi-polar emotions. It’s got a really big driving bassline and the beat in the verses is almost dancey. But then the chorus is classic Ash bubblegum punk-pop. I really love it. It was actually written before Meltdown, but I didn’t think it was that good. But then we started playing it again before we started recording and we all fell in love with it. And there was me thinking it would just be a B-side. But then I thought that about “Goldfinger” too.