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.
Midsummer 2045 they lay upon
The beaches burning
Insects on a ball of rock
Upon it's axis slowly turning
Steel and concrete melanomas
Punctuate the hot sunrise
Spines now chilled by global warming
Microwave their last goodbyes.
For sixty years or more they say
Mankind had known there'd come a day
When there would be a price to pay.
"Square Eyes" watched
The fools game show
The first to go and last to know
Sat eating junkfood on death row
(Feeding the fall of the human empire)
No prophet cast the money lenders
From their polystyrene temples
No one heard the penny drop
All interest shown was incidental.
Pity the chairman of the board
For all these years he's piled his hoard
But penniless he'll meet the lord
As all the world prepares to die
He stands before the needles eye
Whilst countless millions pass him by
(Fleeing the fall of the human empire)
Recalling all those wasted hours
Of motions passed and minutes taken
Maybe now he feels remorse
For all the souls he has forsaken.
Silhouettes of living corpses
Remnants of a transcient race
March toward the red horizon
Evanesce without a trace.
The proud rub shoulders with the meek
On debris littered city streets
They fight like dogs for scraps to eat
The welfare state's in dissaray
All social order slips away
The "Primrose Path" lead to decay
(The Curtain falls on the human empire)
Codes of conduct redefine
As justice turns to legal crime
These monsters masked by human features
Are by far the blindest creatures.
The beaches burning
Insects on a ball of rock
Upon it's axis slowly turning
Steel and concrete melanomas
Punctuate the hot sunrise
Spines now chilled by global warming
Microwave their last goodbyes.
For sixty years or more they say
Mankind had known there'd come a day
When there would be a price to pay.
"Square Eyes" watched
The fools game show
The first to go and last to know
Sat eating junkfood on death row
(Feeding the fall of the human empire)
No prophet cast the money lenders
From their polystyrene temples
No one heard the penny drop
All interest shown was incidental.
Pity the chairman of the board
For all these years he's piled his hoard
But penniless he'll meet the lord
As all the world prepares to die
He stands before the needles eye
Whilst countless millions pass him by
(Fleeing the fall of the human empire)
Recalling all those wasted hours
Of motions passed and minutes taken
Maybe now he feels remorse
For all the souls he has forsaken.
Silhouettes of living corpses
Remnants of a transcient race
March toward the red horizon
Evanesce without a trace.
The proud rub shoulders with the meek
On debris littered city streets
They fight like dogs for scraps to eat
The welfare state's in dissaray
All social order slips away
The "Primrose Path" lead to decay
(The Curtain falls on the human empire)
Codes of conduct redefine
As justice turns to legal crime
These monsters masked by human features
Are by far the blindest creatures.
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