Vision One

I think this song's lyrics are pretty easily deciphered, but I'd like to add my little narration on it all.

I feel it's a reminiscence on Human life as it was going into the 21st century and is a view of how we paved over our future as a organic species. How toward the end of our existence on this planet the few (or many) that are either Human or computer life forms are watching as the world as it was crumbles away, taking with it the sense of what it was to be human and along with it. Coming to the realization that we have evolved beyond what made us 'humane' and emotive, for better or for worse.

I may be reading into it way more than intended, but it just evokes such a beautiful Idea in my mind that there exists more after we leave and that life in whatever form it takes goes on.

I think it is a song about the passing of the human race into some sort of technological singularity.

I believe it's about how humans are losing our humanity; we're becoming more and more like the machines we invented... something essentially soulless.

This song is about transformation into machines and all the the changes that come in the modern era that we can't forsee. Tall skyscrapers, mega-urbanization, is the new way of life, the natural world doesn't exist anymore. The centers of human life is now around cities with big tall buildings, streets, and each new advance in technology and life shadows the natural world evermore so. Gaze on the new world utterly created by us and engineered. "Great machine" refers to the whole civilization as a singular force becoming more machine like so that eventually cities will die as there won't be a need for biology even, no way to feel real breeze caress your smile. So a lot of notions of being human will be left behind as humans involve to the machines they created.

i cannot completely understand the meaning...

I agree with bakamandy. I think this song is about how we live in a world built around production and efficiency, a society of performance and perfection which makes us lose our human nature.

this song is just sick. i love it.

the music, the message, the lyrics, the cadence - fantastic.

The first section speaks about western culture and our technological society, namely the huge buildings that are taking over the green places of the earth...creating changes that no one knew would come of it all.

I feel that the second section is telling us to face up to what we've done and realize that it isn't going to last much longer, possibly as a result of what the first section talks about; the destruction of nature by so called 'civilization'. We must lament the passing of our world because this modern state and modern time is going to end.

The third section seems to speak as if everything had already ended and humans have begun to die off, metaphorically or literally...we have become extinct either in our way of life or physically we are no longer present on the planet.

The last section speaks about the world that has been created and how it has affected human life and mind. We have already plugged into the matrix, already uploaded our souls into machines. Holding onto the sentimental feeling that we are still human is futile because even though many of us don't realize it, we have become more machine and human.

Overall I think this song has a strong message of the ending of human life as we know it, whether it is our end as a species or an evolution into another form, or both...

I'm fairly sure these are the correct lyrics:

There was a time when all the shadows of these tall buildings Would throw their cape around each corner of the grassy field And one by one each huge shade would color the green with black Allowing changes that we could have not foreseen

Everybody let us gaze upon the world we've created Let us rest our eyes upon the great machine as we wave goodbye Feel the evening breeze caress us while the cities are dying As we watch it fall into a modern state, a modern time

Remember when we'd hear the distant sound of human life A zillion noises whimper as they travel through the sky And one by one each new sound has faded away with time Allowing changes that we could not have foreseen

Everybody let us say goodbye to all our notions 'Cause it's not enough to say that we're humane when we're left behind It's too late to think that we can worship human emotions 'Cause we've already evolved into machines in our minds

Kind of reminds me of Burroughs Naked Lunch "The study of thinking machines teaches us more about the brain than we can learn by introspective methods. Western man is externalizing himself in the form of gadgets..."