In a sentence, this song is about confronting the unknown and the nature of knowing -- or rather the lack of knowing. Two of the versus are straightforeward, and the other three are rather vague. But they all stick with the theme.
The very first line sets up the meaning for the entire song, so it bears repeating: "Whenever i drift by the unknown, feign like I notice a fundamental tone." This is a statement of reluctant self-admission. The author is acknowledging that, when faced with the unknown, the unfamiliar, or strange, the natural response is to "feign" like you immediately know and understand it. Like you catch "fundamental tone", even though you don't. The last line, "more explanation and nothing shown," means to say that, regardless of how many times and ways you explain that you understand, nothing is truly "shown" about what you saw.
The next verse plays directly on the first verse. A "friend exiting without a sign" is something unexpected happening, like a friend dying unexpectedly. It glimmers more precious than a fine stone because it was one aspect of reality that you thought you could control. But, clearly, you can't.
The third verse is where the song gets interesting. In this verse MGMT reveals that they are not merely talking about confronting the "unknown," in the sense that people try to explain away ghosts, UFOs, religious experiences with rationalizations. Rather, they mean to say that the whole basis of human knowledge, or what we think we know, is merely an emotional reaction to the lack of ability to truly explain, well, anything. The verse tells all and attacks one of the strongest connections to reality we think we have: science.
Science has led to birds (meaning led to nothing)
Torment igniting essence is the torment of unknowing, which ignites our finding "essence" in things, meaning faulty understanding.
When the "extent of the vice," meaning the extent to which we make up for our lack of real knowledge with foe understanding, is revealed, it is a visceral, upsetting reaction. We want to choke something, and this truth gnaws at our core, further twisting us, increasing our need to understand but furthering us from the truth.
The fourth verse is rather clear. It merely states that freedom is a comforting illusion. The line, "would you feel better holding the stars up?" is a clever reference to ancient astronomy. It means to compare human thought and emotion to how ancient cultures would "draw," more or less, people and scenes on the night's stars to explain the way the world was, like Orion and the Big Dipper, etc. The line is more of a sarcastic comment really. I feel like MGMT is saying, "oh, yeah? You think you're in control? Well would you feel better being a grand constellation that stretched the night sky, holding up the entire universe?" The joke is, of course, that Orion and the big dipper never move and actually have no power whatsoever. They were merely drawn on the sky.
The last verse is the most cryptic. It means to say that apes like people but are presumably not very self aware and don't need to create foe understandings of the world to comfort them to sleep at night. However, MGMT surmises, what if, in an instant, we injected apes with the same self awarness that we have? They would be shocked and horrified "eyes expanding, zeroing in like a scope on the horror of knowing how much we dont know." Then, as the last line in the song, MGMT comes up with the first thought the ape might have after this terrible realization; that they might feel better knowing they werent alone. Thus the creation of religion, myth, society, science, everything.
To sum it up in a quick tidbit, this song is about how humans really have very little grasp on the true nature of reality and we compensate for this by claiming that we know everything, creating grand theories that attempt to explain away all uncertainties in the world (science, religion, etc.)
In a sentence, this song is about confronting the unknown and the nature of knowing -- or rather the lack of knowing. Two of the versus are straightforeward, and the other three are rather vague. But they all stick with the theme.
The very first line sets up the meaning for the entire song, so it bears repeating: "Whenever i drift by the unknown, feign like I notice a fundamental tone." This is a statement of reluctant self-admission. The author is acknowledging that, when faced with the unknown, the unfamiliar, or strange, the natural response is to "feign" like you immediately know and understand it. Like you catch "fundamental tone", even though you don't. The last line, "more explanation and nothing shown," means to say that, regardless of how many times and ways you explain that you understand, nothing is truly "shown" about what you saw.
The next verse plays directly on the first verse. A "friend exiting without a sign" is something unexpected happening, like a friend dying unexpectedly. It glimmers more precious than a fine stone because it was one aspect of reality that you thought you could control. But, clearly, you can't.
The third verse is where the song gets interesting. In this verse MGMT reveals that they are not merely talking about confronting the "unknown," in the sense that people try to explain away ghosts, UFOs, religious experiences with rationalizations. Rather, they mean to say that the whole basis of human knowledge, or what we think we know, is merely an emotional reaction to the lack of ability to truly explain, well, anything. The verse tells all and attacks one of the strongest connections to reality we think we have: science.
Science has led to birds (meaning led to nothing) Torment igniting essence is the torment of unknowing, which ignites our finding "essence" in things, meaning faulty understanding. When the "extent of the vice," meaning the extent to which we make up for our lack of real knowledge with foe understanding, is revealed, it is a visceral, upsetting reaction. We want to choke something, and this truth gnaws at our core, further twisting us, increasing our need to understand but furthering us from the truth.
The fourth verse is rather clear. It merely states that freedom is a comforting illusion. The line, "would you feel better holding the stars up?" is a clever reference to ancient astronomy. It means to compare human thought and emotion to how ancient cultures would "draw," more or less, people and scenes on the night's stars to explain the way the world was, like Orion and the Big Dipper, etc. The line is more of a sarcastic comment really. I feel like MGMT is saying, "oh, yeah? You think you're in control? Well would you feel better being a grand constellation that stretched the night sky, holding up the entire universe?" The joke is, of course, that Orion and the big dipper never move and actually have no power whatsoever. They were merely drawn on the sky.
The last verse is the most cryptic. It means to say that apes like people but are presumably not very self aware and don't need to create foe understandings of the world to comfort them to sleep at night. However, MGMT surmises, what if, in an instant, we injected apes with the same self awarness that we have? They would be shocked and horrified "eyes expanding, zeroing in like a scope on the horror of knowing how much we dont know." Then, as the last line in the song, MGMT comes up with the first thought the ape might have after this terrible realization; that they might feel better knowing they werent alone. Thus the creation of religion, myth, society, science, everything.
To sum it up in a quick tidbit, this song is about how humans really have very little grasp on the true nature of reality and we compensate for this by claiming that we know everything, creating grand theories that attempt to explain away all uncertainties in the world (science, religion, etc.)