Edit: Frankly, after listening to it with my headphones, I gotta say, the experience is different. The way the beats build up, its like classic progressive trance, with 5-6 layers, just sick intoxication ^^x... really adds to the clock/time-bomb ticking and the epic slow-mo heartbeats you have in such dramatic situations =3

Hmm, been hesitating to post this up for a few weeks... frankly.. I agree with most that it is an experimental drift away from the electronical rock they began with... but honestly, I don't think its a bad think... like Green Day's drift, I guess it just shows maturity.

According to an interview, the video is:

"... about what it would be like if mankind had to accept their fate in a time of despair..."

Personally, I love the direction and style of the video. The sense of uncertainty and coldness of the world, is portrayed well with Mike as an uncaring faceless man in a hoodie... by the fog, in which the band members are all isolated.. the monochrome scene, a city in ruins, and widespread panic.... possibly a mimic of the scene of destruction in Hiroshima (which I will explain below)... that agony is portrayed throughout the video..

the takes of Chester partially submerged in water.. with only his face exposed, does remind me of Lucifer in "Dante's Inferno", who for his sins, was to be encased in ice, with only his face exposed for all eternity... are we still threading to stay afloat in our effort to remain humane, or are we have we slowly sunk to the likes of the Devil?

On a sidenote, the clothes and hair here look great, got that V for Vendetta Victorian look... and Mike really look like a scene from Assassin's Creed =3



"God bless us everyone.
We're a broken people living under loaded gun.
And it can't be outfoght.
It can't be outdone.
It can't out matched.
It can't be outrun.
No!

And when I close my eyes tonight,
To symphonies of blinding light.
Like memories in cold decay,
Transmissions echoing away.
Far from the world of you and I,
Where oceans bleed into the sky.

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!

Lift me up,
Let me go."

.... Click Here to read on about my take on "The Catalyst" ^^x...



As a song, the lyrics are deep. Rarely do you find a song, in which almost every verse is filled with puns and metaphors.. really moving towards Muse and Thrice style.. which to a Literature geek is intoxicating =3

To me, the song sparks one to question about life as it is. Thus, functioning as a "Catalyst" in ones life, which is:

"A substance, usually used in small amounts relative to the reactants, that modifies and increases the rate of a reaction without being consumed in the process."

Indeed, this short song tries to encapsulate the happenings of reality: Domination and Morality.

The world today, with its nuclear, military and social power, is indeed "broken" in its fundamental human relationships... and to an extent is working under the threat of a "loaded gun" to function. No matter how much you hate it, against the bigger powers..

It can't be outfought.
You can't win by out-muscle them with force.
It can't be outdone.
You can't win by out-doing them and being better
It can't be outmatched.
You can't even draw with them
It can't be outrun.
You can't even escape after losing to them
No!

Interesting combination of sound and light in the next verse, "To symphonies of blinding light"... indeed, in the urban jungle, headlights, lamplights, and lightings inside buildings, highlight the landscape... this is especially true in Singapore, in which its even coined as being "The city skylight". Just adds to the cold nature of our concrete jungles.

In this "cold" world, where we shun from human relationships, all that is left of the better times are "memories" which too have "decay[ed]" with time. With the rise of the social network... its seems that we use such network "transmissions" more than physical speech... so ironic how a group of people can meet for supper, each physically silent, but all actively engaged to each other through the social network... has speech/small talk really fallen to be that cheap that it is worthless?

the song even cleverly puts it, that in our world of self-isolation, a "world" consisting of "you and I", is as far out as a completely separate world. Thus the metaphor that its "far" beyond the ends of the world, and plays on the idea that if the Earth was flat, the ends of the oceans would end in a waterfall, which would "bleed into the sky".

the next verse is another clever one... "will we burn inside the fires of a thousand suns" ... if you're looking at the typical hell, yeah, its a fiery end... but if you are looking at hell under "Dante's Inferno".. sinners burnt were those guilty of fraud (individual flames) or violence (boiling blood and fire)... which are appropriate sins for today's world... another take at it is that there is a book called "Fire of a thousand suns"... and it an eye-witness account of the tail-gunner on the B-29 that dropped the 1st Atomic bomb on Hiroshima.

Indeed, what will we be paying for?

For the sins of our hand.
Our violent or uncaring actions?
The sins of our tongue
Or our inhumane words?
The sins of our father
Is this lack of understanding, a result of what our fore-fathers did?
The sins of our young
Or are we just as guilty ourselves for living it, not changing, and possibly passing the same values to our kids?