Song history written by TimelandIsWacky

On March 1st, 2016, astronauts Scott Kelly and Mikhail Kornienko landed after a nearly year-long expedition into outer space. While they had been in space multiple times before, the One-Year Mission was specifically done to test how human bodies would react to prolonged time in space. Being an astronaut on a shorter mission is already a hard task, but staying up in the International Space Station for that long, just to see what your body will do to itself to adapt, is something else entirely. Kelly did an interview with CBS days after the landing, and out of all of the things he could have said that were hardest for him to deal with, his answer was personal. “For me it's being away from your loved ones: your friends, your family…” In the docu-series A Year In Space we see the ways it impacts him and his family. When talking about his brother Mark Kelly (an experienced astronaut in his own right), he said “I call him much more when I’m in space than I do on Earth, and it's because you just feel like you’re so far away you need to maintain some kind of connection.” Despite talking to many people – both in space and back on Earth – that isolation from family is difficult.
“Spacesick” is a conversation between an astronaut and his wife from “June 22.” Stu transcribes the conversation. The astronaut describes how much they wish they were back home with their wife while reminiscing on all the fun things they did together. He stops describing his life to ask about his kids – if they’re sleeping and if they made it out to the zoo. Ambrose has a verse describing how the astronaut even got into this position, which is followed by a verse from Joey detailing a vision of the astronaut’s life before handing vocals back to Stu. He continues the conversation from earlier but gives a line which recontextualizes everything: “I love you, over, Stu.” While the lyrics about space travel put the entire thing in a science fiction context, this contextualizes the conversation as one Stu is having with his wife. The song is an allegory for being a touring musician – another profession which requires long amounts of time away from family. This might add more context to the date of “June 22.” While it could have some relation to space travel (which would make sense in a song which namedrops the famous photo Earthrise), it seems to hold a level of personal significance. Perhaps Stu’s referring to June of 2022 when the band played Space Park in Miami or June 22nd, 2023, the day after the band’s first Hollywood Bowl show – the final stop of their US residency tour. The deeply personal lyrics, combined with the soft yet grand music which surprised Stu, creates one of the most emotionally charged songs in the band’s discography.