On the playground you learned how to share with the kids
But you still didn't feel you fit in
How fitting, in confusion when you turned sixteen
You knew how to paint by numbers
But you knew it wasn't rock and roll
You learned tight pants, spray-paint and eyeliner
You said glam-rock would save your soul
But you didn't grasp that the rebellion you wanted wasn't something you can ever be sold

And I never understood how someone could be so willing to be absorbed
Into what I never though could be passed for identity
And I always felt bad for the kids who had to share their faces
With sad teenagers across the world
Found something to fill their loss, without ever adjusting the cause

I heard a speech pattern imitated exactly by a girl in Seattle and a gang in Minneapolis
So I guess he must of learned that from T.V.

You said you'd find yourself for real but feel far out from the goal
You had to paint by numbers but knew it wasn't ro-ro-ro-ro rock and roll!