Some Assembly Required

Some Assembly Required
by Michael Mark & Tom Chapin
© 2005 HCD Music & The Last Music Co. (ASCAP)

It seems every year on my birthday
Before I can have any fun,
The same pesky problem comes rising
As regularly as the sun.
Dad gives me a gift and I love it,
Now all that I want is to play.
Then we pick up the box and we read it,
And that’s when I hear my Dad say…

Some assembly required. Some assembly required.
It’s gonna be great when it’s bolted and wired.
Let’s get out some tools, ’cause I’m feeling inspired.
We’ll put it together together!

We get out the parts and we count them,
There must be two hundred or more.
My Dad gives each piece an inspection,
As if he knows just what it’s for.

Then we open the book of instructions,
And Dad says, “There’s work to be done.
You read and I’ll start the assembly,
And we’ll switch off at page twenty-one.”

Some assembly required. Some assembly required.
My birthday is fleeting and I’m getting tired.
But Dad’s got his tools and he’s feeling inspired.
We’ll put it together together!

There are gears on the floor, spools on the stairs,
We lost a left hinge but who cares?
We’re littered with sprockets and sockets and tape,
Eureka, the thing’s taking shape!

When the top half was screwed to the bottom,
And the batteries snapped to the lid,
The book of instructions was finished,
I said, “Hey Dad, look what we did!”

It was blinking and winking and humming,
And Dad said, “There isn’t a doubt.
This project could be our best ever,
We hardly left any parts out.”

Some assembly required. Some assembly required.
It’s finished and fastened and bolted and wired.
We’ve gotten so good we could probably get hired.
We put it together together!

And I know that next year on my birthday
I’ll be eager, excited and glad,
’Cause there’ll be a new kit that we can outwit,
A gift from my tool-totin’ Dad.

This song appears on Tom Chapin's Some Assembly Required CD.

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