"The Kid" - The Felice Brothers' Ode to Empathy

CAIRO — The great American songwriter Steve Earle once said: "What songwriting does better than almost anything is empathy – it's incredibly empathetic." Lately, empathy has somehow become a concept dragged through the mud. Elon Musk has called it the downfall of Western civilization, and some have coerced factions of its Evangelical Christian followers to view empathy as "a sin" (as if empathy weren't the most Christ-like trait one could practice). Caring for the sick, tired, and poor is not weakness, as empathy is being framed in some circles, but strength. Strengths against the relentless currency of cruelty and greed that dominate our national tone. At this point, empathy is punk rock defiance against authoritarianism, war mongering, and attacks on social safety nets. So a band of songwriters with a punk-rock, DIY ethos with local roots might be the right place to look to for a reminder.

The Felice Brothers have been prolific in adding their empathy-filled songs to the American songbook for years now. The Catskill/Hudson Valley-based band has never left the area, so when they name-drop roads or towns from the region, it's not from a place of rural fetishization; their songs reflect the world they know and see. 2026 marks the official 20th anniversary of the group's start (although who can say where a band including siblings actually began?), having emerged as rural communities were being ravaged by opioids and members of the military were either leaving for tours of duty in the Middle East or coming home in varying conditions. These themes are reflected in "The Kid," a track off their 2019 album, Undress. The band uses a country ballad-style arrangement to explore the life of the titular, unnamed "Kid," and we enter the story as he shoots "Johnny down." He was back from the war/His brain was on fire,/ And he lived in the darkness of dreams. From there, songwriter Ian Felice turns the tables on the listener, who in this case is The Kid's community, which is, of course, all of us. 

Heaven knows the kid

And the things that he did

Were wrong

But who is to blame?

It's as much his crime

As it is yours and mine

Shine a light on the dark

Of Ghost Town, New York

Felice doesn't absolve The Kid of his crimes, but he reserves judgment for those who would be quick to cast The Kid aside for his actions. It's worth noting that Felice includes himself as one who must also reflect on how they may have failed The Kid. 

The second verse deftly summarizes The Kid's heartbreaking backstory, as Felice remembers playing "dice and jacks" by railroad tracks with The Kid when he lived "at The Red Motor Inn." And when his mother OD'd,/ He was just a bad seed/And not one of us here took him in. None of us took him in. We were all quick to identify his bad path, but who stepped up? Who's to say if it would have made a difference at all? But Felice, as the song's narrator representing a community member, knows all too well that they are left without knowing whether it could have prevented a tragic outcome. As he turns to the third and final verse, we hear the narrator lament their inability to escape, forced to live with the choices that led to The Kid's fate, and we are given a definitive location of where the story unfolded.

It's a left at the fork

To Cairo, New York

And that's where I'm stranded in sorrow

But how can I go

The fields deep in snow

And no buses run 'til tomorrow

He's stuck, unable to escape the truth of the matter: The Kid's mother failed him, and so did everyone else. Like the narrator in "The Kid," we will be left with our choices, and we won't know what kind of impact we could have had. But we can learn from their experience, and in the face of the darkness of cruelty, and what they wished they'd done. The narrator can only offer us advice from his hard-earned wisdom, and, in essence, is nothing more than a reminder to take care of your fellow humans and practice some empathy: "Shine a light/ on the dark." Kindness and empathy are resistance. Think of Alex Pretti's final words in the face of institutional cruelty as he was checking on a woman who had been shoved to the ground moments before his murder: "Are you okay?" We can turn to great songwriters like The Felice Brothers or Steve Earle to remind us of the power of empathy. We need it more than ever.