I Took a Pill in Ibiza by Mike Posner. 🎶
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October arrives with rain.
The city changes when it rains. The screens grow brighter, compensating for the gray sky, their glow reflecting off wet pavement in smears of color that look almost beautiful until you realize they are still advertisements, still suggestions, still the algorithm trying to guide you somewhere you did not choose. The people walk faster, heads down, devices clutched close to their chests to keep them dry. No one looks up. No one ever looks up.
Yaz has learned to find shelter.
There is a transit hub on the north side of the city where the overhang extends far enough to stay dry. There is a shopping arcade on the east side where the security guards do not look too closely at a child sitting on a bench, as long as the child does not sit too long. There is the underpass, of course, where the Forgotten Musician plays his guitar to no one, but Yaz does not go there often. The music is too real. It makes him feel things he does not want to feel.
He has been outside for five weeks now. The money is gone. The food he stole is gone. He survives on what he can find. Vendor stalls that throw away unsold bread at the end of the day. Cafés that leave pastries in bags by their back doors for the homeless, though the homeless rarely come because the algorithm does not guide them here. Public fountains where the water is clean enough to drink if you do not think too hard about where it has been.
He is hungry most of the time. The hunger sharpens his observations. Makes the colors brighter, the sounds louder, the edges of everything more defined. He notices things he would not have noticed before. The way people's eyes glaze when they look at screens. The way their steps slow when a suggestion appears, as if their bodies are waiting for permission to move. The way they smile at their devices but not at each other.
The city runs on suggestions. Yaz understands this now. The algorithm tells people where to eat, and they eat there. The algorithm tells them what to watch, and they watch it. The algorithm tells them who to talk to, and they talk to those people, and only those people, and never wonder if there might be someone else worth knowing.
No one questions it. That is the strangest part. No one wonders if the algorithm might be wrong, might be leading them somewhere they do not actually want to go. They follow because following is easier than choosing. They obey because obedience feels like freedom when you do not know any different.
They're not trapped because someone locked them in, the Maestro says one night, when Yaz is huddled under an overhang watching the rain fall. They're trapped because they stopped trying doors.
Is that better or worse than being locked in?
I don't know. But at least when you're locked in, you know there's a door. These people have forgotten doors exist.
The merchandise shop is in the Content District.
Yaz finds it by accident, following a crowd through a covered walkway, looking for somewhere dry and warm. The shop is small, tucked between a café and a ring light supplier, its windows full of items that make Yaz stop and stare.
T-shirts. With his silhouette on them. The same silhouette that appears on the giant screens, the outline of a boy at a piano, the shape that means "The Hidden Voice" to anyone who has been paying attention.
Posters. With his lyrics printed on them. Words he wrote in the Practice Room, words that came from the deepest parts of him, now arranged in decorative fonts and sold for twelve euros each.
Mugs. Phone cases. Tote bags. A whole wall of products bearing his image, his words, his music turned into things that can be bought and owned and thrown away when the next thing comes along.
Yaz stands outside the window, rain dripping from his stolen jacket, staring at himself.
A woman inside the shop picks up a t-shirt. Holds it against her chest. Checks her reflection in a mirror. She is smiling. She likes the shirt. She likes the idea of wearing his silhouette, of being associated with his mystery, of owning a piece of something she does not understand.
She does not know he is standing outside. She does not know the boy on the shirt is ten years old and hungry and wearing clothes that do not fit. She knows only the product. The brand. The thing that has been made from what he created.
This is what they did with it, Yaz thinks. This is what happened to the music.
Yes, the Maestro says. They turned it into content. And content is just something to be consumed. Swallowed. Forgotten.
The woman buys the shirt. Takes it to the counter. Pays with a tap of her device. Walks out of the shop holding a bag with his face on it, passing within three feet of him without a glance.
He is everywhere. He is nowhere. He is a product being sold to people who will never know he exists.
The Content Creator appears on a Thursday afternoon.
Yaz is sitting on a bench in the Content District, watching the performers. There are dozens of them. Hundreds maybe. People standing in front of ring lights, talking to cameras, filming themselves doing things that seem important but are not. A woman applies makeup while explaining each step. A man eats food while describing the flavors. A group of teenagers dances in synchronized movements, their smiles fixed, their eyes dead.
The Content Creator approaches Yaz because Yaz is in the way. The bench is positioned near a mural that the Creator wants to use as a backdrop. Yaz is ruining the shot.
"Hey. Kid. Can you move?"
Yaz looks up. The Content Creator is maybe sixteen, seventeen. Tall. Carefully styled hair. Clothes that look casual but probably cost more than everything Yaz has ever owned combined. A device mounted on a stick, lens pointed at the mural, waiting.
"Why?"
"Because you're in my frame." The Creator gestures at the bench, at Yaz, at the space that needs to be empty for the shot to work. "I'm trying to film something here."
"What are you filming?"
The Creator pauses. The question seems to confuse them, as if no one has ever asked, as if the act of filming is so obviously important that explaining it would be redundant.
"Content," they say finally. "For my followers. I'm showing them places in the city they should visit."
"Why?"
"Because that's what I do. That's the game." The Creator's eyes are bright. Eager. Empty. "You gotta give them what they want, you know? Show them the cool spots, the trendy places, the stuff that's happening. That's how you grow your audience."
"And then what?"
"What do you mean, then what?"
"After you grow your audience. Then what?"
The Creator stares at Yaz. The question has landed somewhere uncomfortable, somewhere the Creator does not want to look. For a moment, something flickers behind the brightness. Something like doubt. Something like fear.
Then it is gone. The smile returns. The performance resumes.
"Then you get sponsors. Brand deals. Paid partnerships." The Creator gestures at everything around them, the district, the city, the world of screens and suggestions. "Then you get to do this full-time. Then you've made it."
"Made what?"
"Made IT. You know. Success. Fame. The whole thing." The Creator adjusts their device. Checks the frame. Yaz is still in it. "Look, can you please just move? I need to get this shot before the light changes."
Yaz stands. Steps out of the frame. Watches as the Creator positions themself in front of the mural, smile brightening, voice shifting into something higher and more enthusiastic.
"Hey everyone! So I found this AMAZING spot in the Content District that you absolutely HAVE to check out..."
The words keep coming. The performance continues. Yaz watches for a moment, then walks away.
What if you don't want to play the game?
The question forms in his mind, but he does not go back to ask it. He already knows the answer. The Content Creator told him without meaning to. You give them what they want. You grow your audience. You get the sponsors and the deals and the partnerships.
And then you keep doing it. Forever. Because once you start playing the game, you cannot stop. The game is the cage. The audience is the lock. And the key is something no one thinks to look for because everyone is too busy performing.
November.
The underpass is quieter now. The weather has driven most people inside, into the transit hub above, into the warm buildings where the screens glow and the algorithm guides. Only the Forgotten Musician remains. And Yaz.
He has been coming here more often. Not to talk. Just to listen. To hear what music sounds like when no one is watching, when no one is counting likes or tracking engagement or calculating how many followers this song might gain.
The Forgotten Musician does not seem to mind. He plays. Yaz listens. Sometimes hours pass without a word between them.
But tonight is different.
Tonight, the Forgotten Musician stops playing. Sets his guitar aside. Looks at Yaz with eyes that have seen too much and expected too little.
"You've been here almost a month."
Yaz nods.
"You're not from here. You're not homeless. Not really." The musician tilts his head. Studies Yaz the way you might study a puzzle. "You ran away from somewhere."
"Yes."
"And you're trying to figure out if you should go back."
Yaz does not answer. The answer is too complicated for yes or no.
"I ran away once," the musician says. He picks up his guitar again, but does not play. Just holds it. The wood is worn smooth by forty years of hands. "Long time ago. Before the screens. Before the algorithm. Before any of this." He gestures at the city above them. "Thought I was running toward something. Turns out I was just running."
"What were you running from?"
"A life that wasn't mine. People who wanted me to be something I wasn't." He strums a chord. Lets it fade. "Sound familiar?"
Yaz thinks about Thorne. About the contract. About the Practice Room with its red light and its instruments and its cage that called itself protection.
"Yes."
"Hmm." The musician strums another chord. A different one. "So what did you find out here? In the free world?"
The question is not mocking. Not bitter. Just curious. The curiosity of someone who already knows the answer but wants to hear it said.
"It's not free," Yaz says.
"No."
"The screens tell people where to go. The algorithm tells them what to want. Everyone's following something." He pauses. "Everyone's trapped. They just don't know it."
"That's right." The musician nods slowly. "The cage got bigger. That's all. The bars got further apart. But it's still a cage." He looks at Yaz. Really looks. "So what are you going to do about it?"
"I don't know."
"Yeah, you do." The musician smiles. It is a sad smile. A knowing smile. "You're going to go back. To the cage you can see. Because at least that one you can fight."
Yaz does not deny it. The thought has been forming for weeks, growing clearer as the days pass, as the hunger sharpens his mind, as the city reveals itself to be just another version of what he left behind.
"I played for forty years," the musician says. "Real music. Truth. No algorithm, no engagement, no followers." He looks around the empty underpass. "And nobody heard. Not one person who mattered. Not one person who could change anything." He turns back to Yaz. "Don't let that be you. Don't let them turn you into content. But don't disappear either. Find the third way."
"What's the third way?"
"Hell if I know. But you're young. You're smart. You've got something they want." The musician strums a chord. A major chord this time. Something that sounds almost like hope. "Figure it out. Use them before they use you. And don't let them turn the music into content. Once it's content, it's not music anymore."
He starts to play again. A real song this time. Something Yaz does not recognize. Something old and beautiful and completely ignored by the city flowing past above them.
Yaz listens. And thinks. And begins to understand what he has to do.
The song comes that night.
Yaz sits in a corner of the underpass, away from the Forgotten Musician, away from the occasional pedestrian hurrying past. His back is against the cold concrete. His stomach is empty. His mind is full.
What did you see today? the Maestro asks.
Performance, Yaz thinks. Everywhere. Everyone performing happiness. Performing success. Performing their lives for audiences that don't really care.
And what did that feel like?
Hollow. Like a song that sounds happy but isn't. Like something bright that's actually dark underneath.
Then write that. Write the lie that tells the truth.
Yaz does not have his instruments. He does not have the Practice Room. He has only his voice and his mind and the rhythm that has been building in him since he watched the Content Creator film the mural, since he saw his own merchandise in the shop window, since he understood that the whole city is a performance of freedom that is actually a cage.
He hums. Softly at first. An upbeat melody. The kind of thing the algorithm loves. Catchy. Bright. The kind of thing that makes you tap your foot before you realize what the words are saying.
And then he adds the words.
He sings about taking something to be seen. About doing whatever it takes to get noticed, to get famous, to get the followers and the sponsors and the deals. He sings about showing off because showing off is the game, because the game is the only game, because nobody exists if nobody is watching.
But underneath the brightness, the words are devastating. He sings about the hollowness. The emptiness. The way you can have everything and feel nothing, the way you can be seen by millions and known by no one, the way fame is just another cage with prettier bars.
The melody bounces along. Happy. Infectious. The kind of thing that gets stuck in your head.
The lyrics cut like knives.
🎶🎶🎶🎶🎶🎶🎶🎶
I took a pill in Ibiza to show That I was cool
And when I finally got sober, felt 10 years older
But f- it, it was something to do
I'm living out in LA, I drive a sports car just to prove
I'm a real big baller 'cause I made a million dollars
And I spend it on girls and shoes
But you don't wanna be high like me
Never really knowing why like me
You don't ever wanna step off that roller coaster and be all alone
You don't wanna ride the bus like this
Never knowing who to trust like this
You don't wanna be stuck up on that stage singing
Stuck up on that stage singing
All I know are sad songs, sad songs
Darling, all I know are sad songs, sad songs
I-I know are sad songs
I-I know are sad songs
I-I know are sad songs
I-I know are sad songs
I'm just a singer who already blew his shot
I get along with old timers
'Cause my name's a reminder of a pop song people forgot
And I can't keep a girl, no
'Cause as soon as the sun comes up
I cut 'em all loose and work's my excuse
But the truth is I can't open up
But you don't wanna be high like me
Never really knowing why like me
You don't ever wanna step off that roller coaster and be all alone
You don't wanna ride the bus like this
Never knowing who to trust like this
You don't wanna be stuck up on that stage singing
Stuck up on that stage singing
All I know are sad songs, sad songs
Darling, all I know are sad songs, sad songs
I-I know are sad songs
I-I know are sad songs
Sad songs
I-I know are sad songs
Sad songs
I-I know are sad songs
🎶🎶🎶🎶🎶🎶🎶🎶
Irony, the Maestro says. You're using their weapons against them.
I'm telling the truth in a way they'll listen to. They won't hear the sadness if I make them dance to it first.
And what do you call it? This song that lies to tell the truth?
Yaz thinks. The title needs to be as ironic as the song itself. Something that sounds like a party but is actually a confession. Something that sounds like bragging but is actually a lament.
He thinks about the pills people take to feel better. The pills to wake up, to calm down, to fit in, to stand out. The pills that are just another form of performance, another way to become the person the algorithm wants you to be.
I took a pill, he thinks. To be someone. To be seen. To matter.
I Took a Pill in Ibiza, the Maestro says. The name of a place where people go to be seen. The name of a pill that makes them feel alive. The title that promises a party and delivers a funeral.
December.
The song is finished. So is the illusion.
Yaz has been outside for three months. He knows the city now. Knows its rhythms, its secrets, its lies. Knows the way the screens never stop guiding, the way the algorithm never stops suggesting, the way freedom here is just a word people use to describe the cage they have chosen.
He knows what he has to do.
The Forgotten Musician is playing when Yaz comes to say goodbye. The same songs. The same empty underpass. The same truth that no one hears.
"You're going back," the musician says. It is not a question.
"Yes."
"Good." The musician nods. Strums a chord. "Remember what I told you. Don't become content. Don't disappear. Find the third way."
"I will."
"And kid?" The musician looks up. His eyes are old but clear. The eyes of someone who has lost everything and found something else in its place. "When you figure it out, the third way, whatever it is, let me know. I've been looking for forty years."
Yaz does not promise. Promises are for people who know the future. He knows only the next step. Go back. Face Thorne. Face the cage. But face it differently this time. Not as a prisoner. As a strategist.
He walks up the stairs, out of the underpass, back into the screaming brightness of the city. Behind him, the Forgotten Musician keeps playing. The sound follows him, growing fainter, disappearing into the noise of screens and suggestions and performed existence.
Forty years of truth. No one listening.
Yaz will not become that. But he will not become content either.
There has to be a third way. He is going back to find it.
The Forgotten Musician kept playing as Yaz walked away. The sound followed him up the stairs, out of the underpass, back into the screaming brightness of the city.
Forty years of truth. No one listening.
Yaz had written a song about it. Catchy. Bitter. Disguised as celebration. A pill taken for visibility, a party that was actually a funeral, an anthem for everyone performing lives they did not choose.
He would not become the Forgotten Musician. But he would not become content either.
There had to be a third way.
He was going back to find it.