The Age of The Understatement

It def sounds like its about a guy who leaves his girlfriend, "Sneak away from your stomach and try your pulse" and goes to either a stripper or a prostitute "she would throw her feather-boa in the road, If she thought that it would set the scene", though he is attracted to her, he knows that his attraction is false and that she is merely seducing him "My fingers scratch at my hair before my mind Can get too reckless". You also know that he feels guilty because he says "The idea of seeing you here is enough to make the sweat go cold" at the end which is referring to his girlfriend

To be honest it really isn't as much about the lyrics as the sound of the words with the strings and the choral type parts.

I think the kind of chorus part could be about the way, in our current society, it's all about the sex and not really feeling. There's this trend of not really feeling intensely, it's all about the understatement.

This girl is a bit of a maneater but she does not really care about any of them, while the guy tries to genuinely attract her by being apathetic, 'stepping away from the parade' when really all this guy wants is for her to 'kiss [him] properly' so that he can fall apart. He’s itching to show how he’s attracted to her but knows that if he did he’d lose her like all the others.

Or at least those are my initial thoughts. I’ll probably change my mind by tomorrow =)

the "dumm du-d-dum du-d-dum du-d-dum" is actually a fairly common chord progression for up-tempo musical styles inspired by Westerns. Which both this and knights of cydonia are.

Beyond that, there really isn't much of a similarity. Knights has a single verse, followed by several progressively complex variations of the same refrain. The inspiration is clearly 80s power metal - with its epic declarations of freedom and so forth.

Age of Understatement is more in keeping with a thematic poem you would normally see accompanying this kind of music post 1960s.

One thing about this song is the lyrics are surprisingly layered and non-obvious in their intent. Aside from Tool and a couple Indie singers, you really don't see that very often.

Please look under 'The Meeting Place' for my take on this song and the whole album.

Basically I think the whole album is about a relationship break-up where he was more serious than her (that is pretty obvious and has been noted by many other people). But in a way this song, even though its first on the album, is a 'hindsight' song. He could see it wouldn't work in the first place ('Move away from the parade') but did it anyway and ended up broken ('kiss me properly and pull me apart') and 'The Meeting Place' kind of tells the end part of the story....and we end up back here and has he learned his lessons for next time?!

awesome song, to say the least

this song kicks ass

yeah i agree with batesy predator that its about the strings and stuff but also i think the lyrics are really important too. this song is brilliant, i cant wait for the album

this song is real great does anyone else think that Alex and Miles look a helluva lot like the Beatles in the video clip??

ive always liked Alex's lyrical kinda style, and this song hasn't let me down can't wait for the album!!!

i don't know if miles helped write the lyrics but alex is definetly my favourite lyricist ever. the videos amazing and it also helps that the boys are both quite attractive :).

I minute I heard this song, I loved it. It kinda reminds me 'Brianstorm', partly cos of the fast beat.

At first I really had no clue what the tune meant, but Batesy predator has a point. So, what she said! :)