199 Meanings
Add Yours
Share
Q&A

One Armed Scissor Lyrics

yes this is the campaign
slithered entrails
in the cargo bay
neutered is the vastness
hallow vacuum check the
oxygen tanks
they hibernate
but have they kissed the ground
pucker up and kiss the asphalt now
tease this amputation
splintered larynx
it has access now

<b>send transmission from
the one armed scissor
cut away, cut away</b>

banked on memory
mummified circuitry
skin graft machinery
sputnik sickles found in the seats

self-destruct sequence
this station is non-operational
species growing
bubbles in an IV loitering

unknown origin
is this the comfort of being afraid
solar eclipsed
black out the vultures
as they wait

dissect a trillion sighs away
will you get this letter
jagged pulp sliced in my veins
i write to remember
'cause i'm a million miles away
will you get this letter
jagged pulp sliced in my veins
i write to remember...
Song Info
Submitted by
moloko On Jan 17, 2002
Questions and Answers

Ask specific questions and get answers to unlock more indepth meanings & facts.

199 Meanings

Add your song meanings, interpretations, facts, memories & more to the community.

Cover art for One Armed Scissor lyrics by At the Drive-In

Ok. SO all of you guys are overthinking this song. Me and my friend earlier found out the TRUE meaning. It's about the journey of a pizza. the "campaign" is the whole experience. the cargo bay is the oven, mummified circutry is just talking about the oven etc. Now, the one armed scissor is the pizza cutter and "cut away" is like someone yelling COME ON MAN HURRY UP CUTTING THE FOOKIN PIZZA RAWR!!! Yep. So there you guys have it. The real meaning of one armed scissor. Enjoy!

@the_? dood, pizza want now

Cover art for One Armed Scissor lyrics by At the Drive-In

ive a feeling that this magnificent song is a representation of a rigourous touring schedule (which atdi actually failed to complete due to chronic exhaustion, leading to the split). the first verse in particular is suggestive of this: "A neutered is the vastness Hallow vacuum check the Oxygen tanks" atdi tackling the massive emptiness, penetrating various places in the world, ensuring that they have enough life in them to do so, ie oxygen. "Pucker up and kiss the asphalt now" is a sarcastic and ironic reference to how they detest the road.

the rest of the song relays the desire for contact with home, highlighting the sickness of touring and also the dependance on technical equipment for contact and also for performance. the video also shows the many negative aspects of touring, such as pushing the vehicle down the road and seemingly endless footage of atdi stage action.

after reading the other interesting interpretations of the song, i do not see suicide theory as credible although it would make sense if there was self hatred and it is impossible to rule out the idea of suicidal thoughts during the tour, as i dont personally know the band.

so they are my thoughts behind the song, its probable im incorrect, but i suppose this is more food for thought for others.

Cover art for One Armed Scissor lyrics by At the Drive-In

This song is about a helicopter in the Vietnam war. "Yes this is the campaign, slithered entrails in the cargo bay." Men were shot up from ground fire by the North Vietnamese, so mens entrails got caught in the cargo bays of the copters. "But have they kissed the ground" The copter hasn't touched base yet with the enemy soil, but "Pucker up and kiss the asphalt now" they are about to land. Once down "splintered larynx, it has access now" it was splintered by bullit fire, "Cut away, cut away" "Send transmission now" they need backup, send transmissions, send helo, "the one armed scissor" A turm used in the military for downed helicopters. this is just my 2 cents.

Cover art for One Armed Scissor lyrics by At the Drive-In

THIS IS WHAT GOOD MUSIC IS. Not puddle of mudd, or staind, or any of that shit, who cares what it means, it's rock and fuckin' roll.

@sierp then why are you here?

Also I like your name, I read it as Slerp when I first saw it.

Cover art for One Armed Scissor lyrics by At the Drive-In

THE WAR ANALOGY IS INCREDIBLY ACCURATE! When he says "pucker up and kiss the asphalt now" it's like a hope for good luck and a last touch with reality and safety after the chopper lands in enemy territory. When he refers the the "campaign", it's most likely the war compaign that the U.S. waged with the communist nations. Sputnik sickles, that is indicative of the communist Russian involvement with the North Vietnamese, always monitoring the situation. when he talks of being "a million miles away" trying to write a letter, he refers to soldiers trying to communicate with loved ones from an alien and completely foreign location. soldiers often had to get amputations because there weren't suitable medical supplies to properly cure things like gangreen and other diseases. "send transmission from the one-armed scissor" is a last resort at communication with allies and people who could help salvage lives in a crashing vessel. "cut away, cut away" is the desperate frenzy of a broken propellor in the sky cutting through the thin air and crashing. "skin graft machinery" is often necessary because of the macabre injuries sustained during a war. "unknown origin is this the comfort of being afraid solar eclipsed black out the vultures as they wait" This indicates the feelings of soldiers located in the vietnamese jungles, trekking into what would seem like oblivion and never really knowing where they were. They were always afraid and lost because when night came, the possibility to see the enemy or the "vultures" disappeared or was "blacked out". The enemy waited like vultures hovering around would-be dead men. Lastly, the "Jagged pulp sliced in my veins" could indicate the entry or exit wound of a bullet, jagged and slicing through flesh. The letter he writes while he's dying from a bullet or shrapnel shard might never reach any of his loved ones because he's afraid and lost. He writes to communicate, but only to be remembered because he knows that he will never reach home alive. that's just my take on the lyrics...who knows, but it does seem to fit perfectly.it could be a blanket statement for the entire war, or like baboonix stated, just an analogy for the crashing of a helicopter.

@WhiteTide Skin graft machinery for Injuries caused by napalm. Cut away means the helicopter has been shot down. Dissect a trillion sighs away is him writing about the horror caused to everybody there. I write to remember means it's his way of keeping in touch with his former life and humanity. Solar eclipsed because they've been shot from the bright sky. It sounds like they've landed in an abandoned ex Russian base. "banked on memory, mummified circuitry, Sputnik sickles found in the seats etc Between the Viet Cong and their injuries becoming infected they're dead without support. Anyway hi...

@WhiteTide a bit literal.

Cover art for One Armed Scissor lyrics by At the Drive-In

this song has SOOO Many different views and hits HOME for EVERYONE who hears it!!! Doesn't it make this song truly amazing, when SOOOOOOOOOO many people can hear it and relate to it and interpret it, either through SUICIDE, LONLINESS WHILE ON TOUR, broken RELATIONSHIPS, or even a VIETNAM WAR HELICOPTER? I dunno which one I believe the most, but i'm Def. in AWE :O

@Lilak totally mad ain't it. I couldn't work out what it was on about but love it.

Cover art for One Armed Scissor lyrics by At the Drive-In

the song is about touring

a scissor has 2 legs or arms .. one armed scissor so its down to one meaning touring is hard like u have one arm or leg........ it makes sense to me

Cover art for One Armed Scissor lyrics by At the Drive-In

Every single song that At the Drive-in has made is incredible, also The Mars Volta and Sparta which the band has split into. I wish they were still around it would be wicked to watch them live. Even from a chicks point of view these are great artists. The one armed scissor is a knife, this song could never be analysed with out the true word from the artists, we will never know

@transatlantic foe* mars Volta is an extra drug enduced disgrace.

Cover art for One Armed Scissor lyrics by At the Drive-In

This song perhaps contains the finest cryptic lyrics that Cedric has written in ATDI. Which is what i think we must remember!!!....that the lyrics are cryptic; they are like jigsaw puzzle pieces that when ALL put together make sense (in their entirety). For those of you who also listen to and for those who prefer THE MARS VOLTA (btw: i congratulate your good taste and recognition that ATDI had to end for THE MARS VOLTA to exist so that Omar and Cedric can make music exactly how they intend to without hinderance from other band members) I am surprised that there has not been the repeated and explicit mention of JULIO VENEGAS - Omar and Cedric's mentor and friend. Even the song by ATDI 'embroglio' talks about him. TMV album 'de-loused' is all about the fictional character Cerpin Taxt (julio venegas) and his journey whilst in a comatoise dream through a fictional world he dreams up (which he awakes from and attempts to return to in 'Take the Veil'. In case you're getting lost, I'll use that MTV interview you lot told people to visit, in which Bixler said. "It deals with a fictional character that represents all of us, and he's dealing with things like culture clash, just being in a new place, being alone for long periods of time, and just being cut off from everything. I think if anyone is confused about things like 'skin graft machinery' just think of the first track off de-loused...'nurse says that my skin will need a graft'. Feeling removed from reality is the whole point in de-loused - Cerpin Taxt can't deal with what's really going on; he keeps doing drugs and removing himself from reality. So when he comes back to reality he doesnt know how to exist, how to be, how to function....maybe like a ONE ARMED SCISSOR????????....(do we get what i'm saying now?) which clearly cannot function properly if it is reduced to half of what it is - like JULIO VENEGAS who felt incomplete in true reality could not function - like the scissor, JULIO VENEGAS being incomplete cannot fulfil any purpose he might have (like one arm of a scissor cannot cut through anything in the way it used to but can only 'cut away' with what remains). This suggestion is the incomplete person can't cut it properly, can't cut through the problems they face, but only cut away from them. I'm interested to see what other people think. And by the way, if my comments sound arrogant, its just because i really dont want anyone to think like the person who said its about pizza.......what a dick, whoever that open-mided person was

Cover art for One Armed Scissor lyrics by At the Drive-In

Just to follow up on my earlier post:

Seriously now, this is not some metaphorical masterpiece, it's almost a play-by-play description of the Alien movies. The whole "mummified circuitry, skin graft machinery" bit is a dead-on description of the H.R. Giger art created for the movie Alien. Giger is well-known as an artist who paints mostly disturbing bio-mechanical scenes.

The "self-destruction sequence" bit is taken right from the damn movie -- they try to blow up the ship and they can't, because as it says in the song, "this station is non-operational."

Slithered entrails in the cargo bay? Another scene from Alien.

"Species in an IV loitering"? Another scene from one of the Alien franchise.

You could even argue the "one-armed scissor" is the bio-mechanical hive first shown after the crash landingin the first movie.

The people trying to stretch this into some grand metaphor about the rigors of life have been listening to too much My Chemical Romance. FFS.

@xystophoros there is nothing wrong with MCR. And also, don't you think that things could have a larger point than a sci-fi film franchise. People write things for reason. At the drive in isn't a nerdy pop culture band like psychostick.