I always wondered whether this song was named after the Twilight Zone episode of the same name, and now that Trent's called a song 'The Four of Us Are Dying' (another Twilight Zone episode) on The Slip, it seems more likely.
The episode 'Where Is Everybody?' is about...
spoilers
A guy in a US Military uniform walking round a small US town with nobody in it apart from himself. It's a lot like the "We're In This Together" video actually. Anyway, he keeps wandering around, having no idea how he got there, who he is, or what he's supposed to be doing, and gradually freaks out more and more. Eventually at the end of the episode he completely cracks and keeps pushing a traffic light button sobbing and crying out for someone to help him. Then the twist is that he was actually a volunteer for a US Space Program who was in an isolation tank to experiment on trying to send man to the moon (the episode was written / filmed in the late fifties). He dreamed the whole town up in his own mind from lonliness and sensory deprivation.
I think Yer Ma is on the right track, as far as the Twilight Episode goes.
I think Yer Ma is on the right track, as far as the Twilight Episode goes.
It actually makes a lot of sense, if you think about the character from the episode asking the question when he is walking around the abandoned town, "Where is everybody?" and then Reznor replying with the ensuing lyrics. Also, the lyrics
It actually makes a lot of sense, if you think about the character from the episode asking the question when he is walking around the abandoned town, "Where is everybody?" and then Reznor replying with the ensuing lyrics. Also, the lyrics
"did you happen to catch
or did it happen so fast
what you thought would always last
has passed you by
is everything speeding up
or am I slowing down
just spinning around"
"did you happen to catch
or did it happen so fast
what you thought would always last
has passed you by
is everything speeding up
or am I slowing down
just spinning around"
and
and
"well okay, enough
you've had your...
"well okay, enough
you've had your fun
but come on there has got to be someone"
really match up with what was going on in the episode: he kept find traces of people, such burning cigarettes in ashtrays, and if I remember at one point he saw a mannequin he believed was a woman... it started driving him nuts because it was as though he was being teased with the idea of finding another human.
The theme of the Twilight Zone episode was "loneliness", and I think that applies really well to what's going on in Reznor's lyrics. Only Reznor isn't singing specifically about the episode, he just taking the question asked and applying it to his reality: Experiencing the loneliness of being the only human left in a world of inhuman wantons.
I always wondered whether this song was named after the Twilight Zone episode of the same name, and now that Trent's called a song 'The Four of Us Are Dying' (another Twilight Zone episode) on The Slip, it seems more likely.
The episode 'Where Is Everybody?' is about...
spoilers
A guy in a US Military uniform walking round a small US town with nobody in it apart from himself. It's a lot like the "We're In This Together" video actually. Anyway, he keeps wandering around, having no idea how he got there, who he is, or what he's supposed to be doing, and gradually freaks out more and more. Eventually at the end of the episode he completely cracks and keeps pushing a traffic light button sobbing and crying out for someone to help him. Then the twist is that he was actually a volunteer for a US Space Program who was in an isolation tank to experiment on trying to send man to the moon (the episode was written / filmed in the late fifties). He dreamed the whole town up in his own mind from lonliness and sensory deprivation.
I think Yer Ma is on the right track, as far as the Twilight Episode goes.
I think Yer Ma is on the right track, as far as the Twilight Episode goes.
It actually makes a lot of sense, if you think about the character from the episode asking the question when he is walking around the abandoned town, "Where is everybody?" and then Reznor replying with the ensuing lyrics. Also, the lyrics
It actually makes a lot of sense, if you think about the character from the episode asking the question when he is walking around the abandoned town, "Where is everybody?" and then Reznor replying with the ensuing lyrics. Also, the lyrics
"did you happen to catch or did it happen so fast what you thought would always last has passed you by is everything speeding up or am I slowing down just spinning around"
"did you happen to catch or did it happen so fast what you thought would always last has passed you by is everything speeding up or am I slowing down just spinning around"
and
and
"well okay, enough you've had your...
"well okay, enough you've had your fun but come on there has got to be someone"
really match up with what was going on in the episode: he kept find traces of people, such burning cigarettes in ashtrays, and if I remember at one point he saw a mannequin he believed was a woman... it started driving him nuts because it was as though he was being teased with the idea of finding another human. The theme of the Twilight Zone episode was "loneliness", and I think that applies really well to what's going on in Reznor's lyrics. Only Reznor isn't singing specifically about the episode, he just taking the question asked and applying it to his reality: Experiencing the loneliness of being the only human left in a world of inhuman wantons.