So, on my way into work today, I was listening to A Thousand Suns and I let my mind wander a bit. For the ones who have been here in the LPA, they know I love to disect the shit out of songs. I was listening to it and was thinking about the Nuclear programs back in the 40's/50's. This time while listening to one of my favorite albums, I almost had a movie playing in my head. It went something like this... The Requiem The movie started out with the building of the atomic bomb to this song. At the end of the song, I had imagined the successful detonation of a nuclear bomb which led me right into The Radiance. The Radiance This part focused on JRO giving his speach while showing successful detonation after successful detonation news reel style. Burning In The Skies I listened to this song thinking about how the plan of using the A-bomb in WWII came into fruition. The ones responsible were telling themselves to be unapologetic as they lost their reputation. Also, in the middle, the song cut away to an internment camp focusing on the planned intent to use the people there to deliver the bomb. The song ends with my thoughts focusing on a Japanese-American man. Empty Spaces That same man that my thought ended with in Burning In The Skies was now running for his life at night from American soldiers. When They Come For Me The Japanese American man is still running from the soldiers. Stopping briefly, teling himself that he will never get caught. The soldiers use some cheap tactics and end up cornering him and is taken away to the Internment camp. Robot Boy Is all about desensitizing the now captured man. Thoughts play news-real style with ways of escaping. He knows his own fate is in his hands and that is when a general comes in with a piece of paper and hands it to the man. Jornada Del Muerto As the man reads the paper, he sees a way out by signing his life away. He signs it and than reads the catch. The catch was it was to betray his motherland country of Japan. Waiting For The End During this song, the man is beating himself up over what he just put hmself in for. He realizes that his fate is now out of his control. He picks himself up and lies to himself in order to go on with the laid plans. The song ends with the dramatic change of captive to soldier. Blackout The soldier now got his training and is now flying in the Enola Gay. The whole time, he is fighting back the feelings of betrayal and how he can live with himself after this mission. The goes into the breakdown with the bay doors opening. The bomb is priming. The soldier's job is to release the bomb from the belly of the plane. The outro now plays as you see a blank stare fade, my thought of a "camera" fades in to being on the ground in Japan of a young girl looking up and seeing the Enola Gay flying high above. Wretches and Kings The man is now fighting himself internally about pushing that button to release to bomb. He keeps thinking to himself how he will forgive himself for doing this. There are his higher ups yelling the order in his face. The man is so sick to his stomach. He looks at his CO and the American flag as he pushes the button when the song ends. Wisdom Justice and Love This is a segment that focuses on the bomb falling towards it's target. Blowing up mid-interlude. Iridescent The start of this song is about the soldier who is now jaded because of what he's done. He feels like a failure, a betrayer and a murderor. As the man collapses into tears, he realizes that this was done not by him, but by his country. Fallout This part focused on the flight back home and being welcomed as heroes. The Catalyst The beginning is a sped up part of his life where the man gets out of the internment camp and the war ending. The arms race of the cold war has begun churning. Lift me up, let me go now starts. The man, now older sees this and and feels guilty that he helped create a world where nuclear haulocaust is a very real possibility. The Messenger This song plays as you see pictures of the man at his funeral. The stinging words of the song are a testament of the lesson that this man learned during his life. The man was so hungry for his freedom that he lost control of who he was. Granted, this wasn't by his own doing, but he was a victim of his time. The movie ends with a folded flag given to his mourning wife accompaning a 21 gun salute. This account is't what the songs mean to me. This was just a story that popped into my head that I thought I would share with you. Thank you for reading! What do you think?
My take on A Thousand Suns is about the current status of Earth, and how at any time we could be destroyed be nuclear warfare. "God bless us everyone, we're a broken people living under loaded gun." Admitting that we are powerless over our own wrongdoings, submitting ourselves to God as a result of this: "We knew the world would not be the same. A few people laughed, a few people cried, most people were silent. I remembered the line from the Hindu scripture, the Bhagavad-Gita... "Now, I am become Death, the destroyer of worlds." Openheimer talking about the destruction of Hiroshima, how the United States became a superpower capable of diminishing vast amounts of life in a matter of seconds. “I'm swimming in the smoke of bridges I have burned, so don't apologise i'm losing what I don't deserve.” Accepting and apologising for our wrongdoings: “Someday the weight of the world (accepting the world) will give you the strength to go (live)” Telling others to accept life at it is and you will start living: Waiting For The End, go listen to this song now and have everything before this in mind. Blackout to me is like Chester arguing with a really ignorant fan who doesn't understand Robot Boy lol, then Mike comes in: “Floating down / as colors fill the light We look up from the ground / in fields of paperwhite And floating up / you pass us in the night A future gazing out / a past to overwrite So come down / far below We've been waiting to collect the things you know Come down / far below We've been waiting to collect what you've let go” This part could mean a variety of things, someone moving on from negativity they've had around them? Destruction of Hiroshima? “a past to overwrite” “Get down, and obey every word. Steady, get in line if you haven't yet heard. Wanna take what I got, don't be absurd. Don't fight the power, nobody gets hurt.” Wretches And Kings is about anarchy: ..and an uprising against that anarchy. "There's a time, when the operation of the machine becomes so odious. Makes you so sick at heart, that you can't take part, you can't even passively take part. And you've got to put your bodies upon the gears and upon the wheels, upon the levers, upon all the apparatus. And you've got to make it stop! And you've got to indicate to the people who run it, to the people who own it, that unless you're free, the machine will be prevented from working at all!" Iridescent is vaguely self explanatory which is what makes it so powerful initially.. it translates into a lot of meanings, but the main one is to forget the bad things that have happened to you, or are going to happen to you if (nuclear warfare) don't let it hold you back; let go of it and live your life anyway. The Catalyst represents a nuclear explosion, and people running around trying to survive it. “God save us everyone, Will we burn inside the fires of a thousand suns? For the sins of our hand The sins of our tongue The sins of our father The sins of our young No!” Chester needs to be applauded for this one, I think he wrote this: “like memories in cold decay” Transmissions echoing away! Far from the world of you and I! where oceans bleed into the sky!”
Awesome story. They should have made this into an album-long video. Off topic, but your sig is sick as fuuuck.
Wow, interesting read, Hybrid! I really put all this into context and could see and hear the imagery you were describing in the story. If this was meant to be a concept album and truly have a story behind it, I'd imagine this is a pretty good one!
What I like to do is turn it on and close my eyes for the whole thing. And every song kind of puts out a certain scene or atmosphere. It's like a dream only I'm awake.
Yeah, I also thought it was about a soldier and a man running away. When They Come For Me gave me this idea. Mine goes: Requiem = Both (midnight) Radiance = Oppenheimer's speech (after midnight) BITS = Mike's part is the runaway, Chester's the soldier (daytime) Empty Spaces = Both, one searching for the man and one running (at midnight) WTCFM = Runaway (daylight in the jungle) Robot Boy = I haven't pictured this in the story but rather as something aside from ATS. I never felt it fit. I picture Mike with a piano in a completely white room. Jornada = First bomb going off (sunset, almost night) Waiting For The End = Soldier (daylight) Blackout = Chester's runaway, Mike's soldier (flying in the night sky with white bright lights glowing) Wretches & Kings = Also aside from the story, I pictured the first time Mario Savio's speech turning into a riot. Wisdom, Justice & Love = picture MLK's speech Iridescent = Both (before midnight) Fallout & The Catalyst = Both, everything going to shit, second bomb goes off and tons of people die as they embrace their end (midnight) The Messenger = The soldier and the runaway reunite amidst the havoc (dawn)