Lyric discussion by popeyexox 

Cover art for Group Four lyrics by Massive Attack

Clearly this song is about working as a security guard. The reference to the security company Group Four suggests this. Alongside:

  • "relay cameras"
  • "sober tea"
  • "martial arts"

Don't forget Mezzanine is an album about paranoia. One could only imagine the paranoia a security guard feels when he's not

feeling up to the job. "My ears know that my eyes are closed" suggests the guard is lax on the job. Infact, in all probability, this is

probably a song about severe cannabis / meth psychosis, where the security guard must allow his mind to wander, yet still do his

job correctly.

"Flickering I roam" suggests a kind of twilight zone between the guard's imagination and the real-world. Furthermore, the "glazed lane" sees a "world" inside the guard's mind, as if to suggest he can navigate "Far away", "Elsewhere", but still attend to what's happening around him.

Overall I think the song's about playing the role of Big Brother, but the real Big Brother makes sure you suffocate from trying to immitate him. The song's about How you can't be yourself for one minute without someone seeing what you're doing. How we need a "sixth sense" to intuit the world because our five senses have been compromised by mass surveillance.

Two mentions of Light are seen aswell. "Daylight" & "Striplight". Alternatively the song could be about his lover requiring him to work a shitty night job, as opposed to a "simple job in striplights", where he could be happy. Yet the fact he says "Daylight sends me home" implies when he finishes work, he is happy. Overall the song is a message of hope. That no matter how bad your working circumstances are, that there is Light at the end of it all!

Also, it should be mentioned that Group 4 guarded prisons.

I never would have thought it was about being a security guard. That's very interesting.

But I did think it did have a "Big Brother", Orwell sense to it, as you said. Lines such as: "Perish thoughts like contraband (be rid of impure, and radical thoughts for consequential reasons) I train myself in martial arts As advertised I reinforce my softened parts As advertised" (do as you see, do as you hear, do as you're taught)

There are so many more words from this beautiful form of art labeled "Group Four" that portray these same thoughts....

Popeyexox sounds fairly clever in this analysis, but it it incredibly obvious that Popeyexox has never done 'cannabis' or 'meth' or has ever had a side by side comparison, because, neither one bears ANY resemblance to the other, outside of the fact that both are illegal in most first world countries. 'Cannabis' leads to little or no psychosis, whereas, 'meth' (or what passes for it in the U.S. in the last two decades) DRIVES psychosis like Dale Earnhardt used to drive cars. The two should never be placed in the same category, much less, separated by a simple...