One of our Submarines

as a squid who has spent half of his life studying the nav...she went down in the Baltic..."a hungry heart, to regulate there breathing"...a nuclear boat..."the winter boys"...most nuc boats are "blue" and "gold", meaning they have two seperate crews, they are at sea 12 months a year, each crew serves a six month cruise, so "the winter boys" would have been the winter crew..."bye bye Empire", self explanatory..."The red lights flicker, sonar weak Air valves hissing open Half her pressure blown away"...as part of USN Omaha Force I spent a (small) amount of time on subs doing security for nuclear weapons, this is the most chiling description of death at depth I have ever heard...no doubt the best song he ever did!!!!

He speaks in this video about how his uncle was a submariner who died in basically the way described in the song, but it also refers to, or is at least emblematic of, the decline of the British Empire.

http://youtu.be/ys7EpQ9tFi4

The greatest song Thomas Dolby ever produced. I first heard this song in March of 1983 on an eighth grade school trip from Connecticut to Washington, DC. I bought the cassette and listened to this one track on my Walkman probably 500 times over the course of a five day trip. Now, 24 years later, this song is as captivating as ever!

yeah...great stuff. thomas morgan dolby robertson once described himself as a frustrated novelist who stumbled into a musical career. the lyrics reflected his literary ambitions, which IMO were often justified. or, maybe he found the most suitable field for his talents after all, however accidentally. "tired illusion drowning in the night..."

it's supposed to read "Spam tin," of course

my father served on a not-quite-so-cramped but similarly insular naval vessel. lucky he made it through: for me anyhow, otherwise who'd be writing these words?

I recorded this song from the radio when I was a kid - I hoped the DJ would have spoke the Artist name or title but didn't and I didn't know for years who made on of my favorite songs. I finally heard it playing at Outback of all places. I hushed the whole restaurant until it was over. The waiter who made the mix CD came and gave it to me and finally I had it. The line, " drinking heavy water from a stone," Both biblical and scientific. Like Moses striking the stone to save his followers. But heavy water is a reference to the reactors responsible for enriching uranium and plutonium to weapons grade. I think it's about an accident leading to radiation contamination - and knowingly not calling in for fear of radiation escaping. That's what I felt was the message.

This song might be the most underrated song of the 80s. It's beautiful, it's chilling, it's haunting.

I found this song while skipping through tracks (uh intentionally, not because there was a scratch) on a copy of Golden Age of Wireless I got on vinyl for 50 cents, and I fell right in love. This song could have easilly bypassed the popularity of Science if it had been allowed to.

You'll be amazed how many others who also owned that album (myself included) felt the same way!

The golden age of wireless is one of my all time favorites and I can't count the number of times I've bought it. I've come out of lurkdom to thank everyone here, for your way smarter than me take on this disc. One of our submarines has been one of my many earworms for months and now. I'd forgotten how much I scare myself meant to me many moons ago.

I luv this song. While the true meaning is somber, I think of it often as I have a lot of rescue/stray kitties that like to be outside, and when one fails to make it home, I am reminded how they are like my little submarines, I don't know where they are or went, and can only hope they make it home. One recently didn't make it home, reminding me once again of this song, so I burned a cd with it as song #1, and play it in my car often in remembrance of my lil buddy Simba