Obfuscation

First of all, this band soooo fucking nails the formula of intro/2nd track cohesion. When Tommy's keys bleed into "Obfuscation" at the end of the intro, I get the biggest goosebumps since first hearing Colors (which STILL gives me chills EVERY TIME I listen to it). If there was anything I would hope to be repeated on each album, it's that combination. Of course, these two stand apart more than previous pairings, (I simply can't listen to "The Backtrack" without "Decade of Statues", and vice versa) I mean, "Mirrors" is three and a half minutes, but it's still an intro next to the beast that is track 2 :) They have their seperate appeal, but the chemistry is there nonetheless.

I love "Close one eye, step to the side..." because I actually have been playing with my vision that way since I was a kid. You know how if you're looking at something with one eye, then the other eye, it seems to move, even if you sit still, because it's actaully a slightly different vantage point for each eye? Always been fascinated by that :) I think it just speaks to the idea of looking at things from a different perspective. "Obfuscation" means "to confuse or obscure" (everyone's in fragments, the great misdirect, etc), while "Mirrors" eludes to there always being a reverse to anything you might think you understand, and the brain references obviously point to perception in general. I mean come on, when is Tommy NOT talking about EVERYTHING in the damn universe? I imagine this 2-parter is all about the human condition and our feeble presumptions of our purpose here, and our perception of this experience... whatever it is.

Also Tommy is telling us to put a bib on because our "brains" are in for an auditory feast :) Heh, sorry, my ears are so gay for this band...

This song is telling you not to believe every thing you see. i was confused when they said there will always be a Marfa but when i got to thinking about the Marfa lights it started to click. There will always exist a Kryptos goes for the same meaning. but more along the lines of that there is more to be seen. and ironically that clicks with the song title obfuscation which means to purposely make something confusing. Everything fits together perfectly in this song.

This song is about the limits of the nervous system as exhibited in humans. It deals with perception, or rather our primitive foundations which direct our senses.

Change blindness:

en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Change_blindness

csc.ncsu.edu/faculty/healey/PP/movies/Airplane.gif

As this relates to the lyrics of the song, we are basically being blinded constantly from the "truth", that is, the purpose of this thing we call reality. We are locked in this physical "shell". Obfuscation is the concealment of intended meaning in communication, making communication confusing, intentionally ambiguous, and more difficult to interpret. You can interpret this as a sort of Big Brother watching you, controlling the media and what knowledge you are permitted to gain, or, you can easily see that without some external force, we as organisms are inherently shielded from knowing everything that is going on around us, from a microscopic to macroscopic scale, due to the fact that we are only as good as evolution will allow, at this present time, which on a relative scale, is practically insignificant.

I think that this song is speaking most about being able to see through other's deception. The whole 'close one eye step to the side' is exactly like crackhead was saying up there, it's a way to change your perspective and see past what you first perceive.

If you've seen their short film that was recently released for this song, you'll notice that it involves a magician hypnotising people and messing with their minds and such. The song itself eludes to magicians like this;

'A magician's pure joy' - deceiving the audience 'A mind bend for the common folk' - the audience being deceived 'Follow the straight line...(A full house watching what we can't see)' - here it gets interesting. I remember from some documentary I watched that illusionists like to use this trick...basically, the human eye is more prone to follow a straight line than a curve. So, illusionists with make motions in a straight line when they want to divert your attention to one hand, while the other hand makes a curving motion with which they do whatever they didn't want you to see. I think this is actually what he's refering to, too much of a coincidence for it to be something else.

Just thought I'd through that out there for anyone bored enough to bother reading it all.

doesn't sound like it's religious really. big words (ideas) here are change blindness, obfuscaton (song name), the great misdirect (album name), etc. that doesn't really ring w/ religiosity, as i've never heard an anti-theist refer to any religion in those terms. throw in the marfa reference, and religion goes right out the window. it sounds like an eloquent, educated approach to normalizing the paranormal, and addressing the struggle between the search for the truth despite the government's attempt to obfuscate the clear signs of it.

The Nexus (above) unveiled the meaning of this song for me.

Unless I am deceived, which is always a possibility of course, this song is about the inherent deception in our perception. In other words, the perceiver is the "Ultimate Deceiver."

It is almost undeniable that this is what the song is about. I will start from the beginning, and I will use many things from the prior posts.

Change Blindness: according to wikipedia, change blindness "is a normal phenomenon of the brain which show in light that the brain does not have a precise representation of the world but a lacunar one, made of partial details." This is my favorite example: in 1998, a study was conducted where a man would approach people on a college campus and ask for directions. Mid-conversation, two men would carry a large board in between the direction giver and direction receiver. During that brief time period, the direction receiver would be replaced. A bunch of people failed to notice. Why? (1) Maybe our brains only really recognize what they perceive to be important (thus, in this situation, they would recognize a lost person, but the actual characteristics of that person would be unimportant) or (2) Maybe our brains try to make sense of things (thus, in this situation, our brains would merge the images of the two people to prevent the illogical possibility that the person transformed, or that we were imagining a different person before, etc.). Notice, that there is no real deception with Change Blindness; our eyes see the images they are supposed to (i.e., our eyes see two different people). But our brains reject that image. Instead, we only "perceive" one individual. Without our brains, the trick would not work.

Of course, we don't want to admit this because it is "a brain function we'll never admit as defeat."

Another line: "An unspoken religion in being the ALL-DOMINANT...This is what we call a brain." In other words, our brain is religiously devoted to being the ALL-DOMINANT. Or our brains are devoted to making themselves seem all-dominant. If our brains seek perfect dominance, then they would never let us realize that there is something outside ourselves that they cannot make sense of (change blindness).

Another line: "Close one eye. Step to the side." If you cover one eye, close one eye, or take on step to the side, then your entire perception of the world changes. You cannot see things that you could see before. Those things you can see may be cast in more sunlight or in more shadow. Because our brains our so self consumed, we may naturally assume that the changes we see are actually occurring or that we are perceiving something else that is causing such changes in our perception. However, we are the cause of the change. Without us moving or closing an eye, our perception would not change.

Another: "As humans, we could never be content with knowing all. Yet we can't be content with the fact that our brains will never know." I think the phrase "we can't be content with the fact that our brains will never know" speaks for itself. How could we be content with the fact that we can't trust what our senses are telling us?

Now, here is the fun part (thanks to The Nexus as well): "A magician's pure joy. A mind bend for the common folk. Follow the straight line (a full house watching what we cannot see)." According to The Nexus, "Follow the straight line" refers to how our eyes naturally follow straight lines rather than squiggly lines. Thus, a magician "deceives" us by moving one hand in a straight line while moving the hand with the real item of interest in a straight line. We only see the squiggly hand. But notice that if we actually watched the squiggly hand, then the magician would not be successful in deceiving us. In other words, we are the most important part of the deception. If our brains didn't do their jobs, then the whole trick would fall apart. Thus, we are "the ULTIMATE DECEIVER."

Finally, Tommy makes it utterly obvious for us at the end:

"We will always be part of the Great Misdirect."

yeah this song is definitely about opening your eyes. I believe this is why he mentions Marfa which would also add to the "open your eyes" theme.

en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Marfa_lights

Its also more than just opening your eyes, i think its just about human need to know everything yet things are kept from us (us being "others")that will will never know because people in power think we "cant understand"

"Hide what "others" can't understand. The universe is the biggest threat... overachiever that commands attention. Brute force of hysterical reasonings... There will always be a Marfa."

cr4kh3d, we need to hang out and listen to btbam someday. because you think exactly the same way i do. lol

i think it says "A brain MALfunction we'll never admit as defeat...."

yes, the lyrics are "a brain malfunction we'll never admit as defeat..."

and

OHMYFUCKINGGOD!!! i bought and listened to this like three hours ago and i STILL have an erection.