In regards to the meaning of this song:
Before a live performance on the EP Five Stories Falling, Geoff states “It’s about the last time I went to visit my grandmother in Columbus, and I saw that she was dying and it was the last time I was going to see her. It is about realizing how young you are, but how quickly you can go.”
That’s the thing about Geoff and his sublime poetry, you think it’s about one thing, but really it’s about something entirely different. But the lyrics are still universal and omnipresent, ubiquitous, even. So relatable. That’s one thing I love about this band. I also love their live performances, raw energy and Geoff’s beautiful, imperfectly perfect vocals. His voice soothes my aching soul.
Boats ease into the harbor bearing real suspicious cargo
And the sunlight on the water
Sets a switch off in your brain
The things that you've got coming will consume you
There's someone waiting out there in an alley with a chain
The ghosts that haunt your building are prepared to take on substance
And the dull pain that you live with isn't getting any duller
There's a closet full of almost-pristine videotape
Documenting sordid little scenes in living color
Here they come
The young thousands
Here they come
The young thousands
You drive east from the ocean with both hands tied on the wheel
And you go past Garden Grove
As the pleasure index rises
The things that you've got coming will do things that you're afraid to
There is someone waiting out there with a mouthful of surprises
The ghosts that haunt your building have been learning how to breathe
They scan the hallways nightly vainly searching for a sign
There must be diamonds somewhere in a place that stinks this bad
There are brighter things than diamonds coming down the line
Here they come
The young thousands
Here they come
The young thousands
And the sunlight on the water
Sets a switch off in your brain
The things that you've got coming will consume you
There's someone waiting out there in an alley with a chain
The ghosts that haunt your building are prepared to take on substance
And the dull pain that you live with isn't getting any duller
There's a closet full of almost-pristine videotape
Documenting sordid little scenes in living color
Here they come
The young thousands
Here they come
The young thousands
You drive east from the ocean with both hands tied on the wheel
And you go past Garden Grove
As the pleasure index rises
The things that you've got coming will do things that you're afraid to
There is someone waiting out there with a mouthful of surprises
The ghosts that haunt your building have been learning how to breathe
They scan the hallways nightly vainly searching for a sign
There must be diamonds somewhere in a place that stinks this bad
There are brighter things than diamonds coming down the line
Here they come
The young thousands
Here they come
The young thousands
Lyrics submitted by I'm a Pirate
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All the songs on the album "We Shall All Be Healed" are about John Darnielle's youth. Apparently he was pretty big into drugs.
I think that in the first stanza, the line "things that you've got coming will consume you" refers to the drugs he is about to acquire. Then the person "waiting out there in an alley with a chain" is either the police (waiting to jail him) or a drug dealer (whose drugs are a metaphorical chain on the user).
The "Dull pain" in the second stanza refers to the pain that you get any time your addicted to something and have to go without it for a while.
Later on, I think the narrator desperately needs to have his drugs, and so he drives (past Garden Grove) and as he gets closer to acquiring the drugs he gets excited (the pleasure index rises).
Diamonds are a metaphor for the drugs as well, I think, while "the ghosts that haunt your building" are the feelings of addiction that come from withdrawal from a substance he is addicted to.
I have no idea what the chorus means. Who or what are the Young Thousands?
I think you're right, generally speaking, but I don't think the chain is a metaphor. A heavy chain is a pretty effective improvised weapon of the sort a drug dealer might carry.