The Butcher

First of all, I believe "warrior" is the correct word for these lyrics.

If you go and YouTube "Sir Ken Robinson - Do School's Kill Creativity." This song will make a lot more sense. First a few quotes:

"All children are born artists, the problem is to remain artists as we grow older"

• Picasso

"Everybody is a genius, but if you judge a fish by its ability to climb a tree, it will grow up believing it is stupid." - Albert Einstein

"Children are born true scientists. They spontaneously experiment and experience and reexperience again. They select, combine, and test, seeking to find order in their experiences - “which is the mostest? which is the leastest?” They smell, taste, bite, and touch-test for hardness, softness, springiness, roughness, smoothness, coldness, warmness: they heft, shake, punch, squeeze, push, crush, rub, and try to pull things apart."

• R. Buckminster Fuller, American engineer, systems theorist, author, designer, inventor, futurist and second president of Mensa International (1895-1983)

Today's global society values profit over beauty, obedience over thinking.

Think about how beautiful the innocence of youth is. We see someone getting hurt and don't hesitate to call it wrong. This song's message is in the same vain as MGMT's "Kids" but more sinister.

Thom Yorke pointing out how we take these things for granted, tell people to "grow up," throw beauty away so that "the man who has everything," 1% of the super rich, can turn us into warriors. Society teaches "don't get raped" rather than "don't rape." Society teaches not to talk to strangers, don't trust others, etc. We're taught not to be musicians and dancers and philosophers because being a lawyer, banker or CEO will make you more money. It's no wonder the teen suicide rate is higher than it ever has been in decades. You'd think they wouldn't have done it if their friends took better care of them. What are "friends" nowadays anyway? Facebook numbers, it seems.

All through our lives and as we grow older, our individuality, creativity and what makes us beautiful as humans gets "chopped up" until we can look at violence and not care. We can see suffering and not give a shit. Eventually we're just slabs of meat going through the motions, alive but not living. 9 hours in a cubical. 9 hours at a cash register. Heart's still pumping.

If you're listening to a high quality version of this track, listen closely at 2:24. These are samples of human baby sounds.

I used to never understand how anyone could grow up to end up breaking the necks of cows, slitting the necks of pigs, etc. The whole religious argument of "man is born evil" has been increasingly proven wrong. It's ignorant if you think this is normal.

Stay beautiful, people.

Sometimes when you are born beautiful, you get a different perspective on life. You get choices that alot of people will never comprehend. I think this song is about a man who is used to getting anything he wants or more specifically anybody he wants...and though he has options other people cannot even comprehend...in the end he is still lonely and empty.

Beauty will destroy your mind Spare the gory details Give them gift-wrapped for the man with everything Though I lived a lonely life I was confused I butcher, I feel nothing

As it courses up my arms In position of the worms Up up through my heart, into my brain I'm in bits, like a basic combination Cut out chopped liver on the block A heart still pumping, my heart's still pumping

He's a worrier, a worrier Here's a little bitch coming out of him He's a worrier, a worrier Here's a little bitch coming out of him Coming out of him

To me, this song is about the way things fall apart under the touch of "cold philosophy", our worry, over-analysis, and need to deconstruct everything - the butcher in our brains. Here's a portion of Lamia by John Keats which summarizes the kind of emotion I think this song is talking about:

"Do not all charms fly At the mere touch of cold philosophy? 
There was an awful rainbow once in heaven:
 We know her woof, her texture; she is given 
In the dull catalogue of common things.
 Philosophy will clip an Angel's wings, 
Conquer all mysteries by rule and line,
 Empty the haunted air, and gnomed mine
 Unweave a rainbow, as it erewhile made The tender-person'd Lamia melt into a shade."

The song is about looking back on your life, realizing you have been a butcher to the tender, important things in life, and have grown lonely, unable to feel much of anything because of it. Perhaps you have become this way because you feared "beauty will destroy your mind". I'm not sure what "gift wrap for the man with everything" means, but perhaps the "gift wrap" is the philosophy, the summary, the container, the "dull catalogue of common things" as the poem puts it. Yet your "heart's still pumping", you wish to overcome this critical part of your thoughts.

i like it.

put it on TKOL !!!

Hahaha oh man did I wreck those lyrics when I first submitted them. To be fair, Thom was fairly unclear on this track, especially when only poor quality leaks were available.

This song totally threw me off when I first heard it. I didn't figure out the rhythm until the real drums came in. If you go by the original counting right when the song starts, then the drum set doesn't synch up. If you hear each measure beginning with the bass note however, it matches up when the drum set comes in. Blowing my mind. It's like two different songs for the first half.

He's a worrier A worrier There's a little bitch coming out of him.

Sorry for the double post but I wanted to say this song reminds me a lot of Bill the Butcher from the movie "Gangs of New York".

I say the movie character and not the actual historical person because the two are pretty different.