Amused To Death Lyrics
Yep, or to put it more bluntly, "we've fucked up as a race, destroyed any culture we had by watching tv, fucked up spirituality, and then destroyed each other". And of course, since we are one fucked up race, aliens can't find any explanation for our demise and come up with their only explanation. That we just amused ourselves to death when our culture embraced war as entertainment and destruction as a way of life.
You need to look no further than the title to trace the meaning. "Amused to Death" (the whole album actually) relates to Neil Postman's book "Amusing Ourselves to Death". Neil is big on how technology negatively affects the human race and especially public discourse. In this tune from the album Roger sums up all the rest. Take popular culture, consumerism, technology, etc. put it all together and this species has amused itself to death. Personally, I don't see it really related to nuclear war - otherwise why would the alien anthropologists be so perplexed when trying to figure out what happened to us? They'd easily see the destruction of a nuclear war, but instead they just find our shadows around a TV set. They have to repeat every test and the only logical reason they can come up with is that we've amused ourselves to death.
A gorgeous end to a gorgeous album. The lyrics are pretty much self-explanatory, but they're about people neglecting the intellectual/rational side of things and instead caring about Melrose Place and cheap supermarket goods.
one of the best songs ever. period.
what a brilliant song. what else can i say
The meaning has been explained, except for the point of the Western Woman/Western Girl lines. Anyone care to help?
its the western woman and girls who are living the super market life
Gorgeous song, beautiful and elegant. And it rocks. I always wondered about the Western Woman lines myself. I never realized that perhaps Roger Waters was just speaking to the women of western culture. It's actually a really sad song. Not just bitter, but truly sorrowful.
I have to agree with Bilko that this is not about after a nuclear war it is if aliens came down today and that we are already shadows sitting in front of TV sets
The western women part actually confuses people? They are some of the most self-indulgent, vapid people on the planet right now. If the song is referring to anyone responsible for amusing the race as a whole - to death, it's them.