An interpretation...

[spacemonkeyadb]

I think that this song is intended to be read at two different levels.

Firstly, at a literal level the song is the story of someone who was tripping on LSD and believes that he was abducted by aliens during his experience. I believe the song is deliberately ambiguous as to whether he actually was abducted or just thought he was due to the drugs. This way we as listeners can share in his confusion. The band has claimed that this song is "a criticism of undisciplined spiritual exploration/ignorant pschedelic use", and as far as the literal level is concerned, I think this is quite true.

Secondly, though, I think that the song is also intended to have a definite meaning at an allegorical level. I think the song is also "a criticism of the undisciplined use of Tool's music" in achieving spiritual understanding. Try substituting Tool for the alien(s), and (misguided) Tool fans for the tripping abductee, and maybe you'll see what I mean.
Consider how dumb and ridiculous the tripper appears when he believes that aliens with a vitally important message would actually choose a bed-shitting dropout like himself as their messenger. And if the aliens actually were real, then consider how stupid they are for making such a choice.
Now consider this same situation as depicting Tool trying pass on the "vitally important" message contained in their music to their audience. I believe this song is aimed at the kind of fan who goes too far by elevating Maynard (and the band) as some kind of mystical messiah with all the answers to the mysteries of existence. Such a fan then comes away from their music "overwhelmed" and feeling that they've been given these answers but lacks the ability to decipher the lyrics and understand them, kinda like the tripper in this song.
I think the song deliberately portrays the relationship between Tool and their audience from the warped perspective of just such a fan, in order to show how ridiculous it is. Tool is only a "tool" to achieving spiritual understanding - they don't have all the answers, you have to THINK FOR YOURSELF. If the aliens had such a vital message to pass on, they wouldn't choose this ignorant user of psychedelic drugs as a messenger. And if Tool really had ALL the answers to life, existence, and the universe wouldn't they be more than mere rockstars/musicians singing to a comparatively narrow audience?

The title of the song also supports this two-level interpretation. It refers both to being "stoned", and to the Rosetta Stone which was the key to deciphering ancient Eqyptian heiroglyphics. Similarly, the song is about the wrong way to use psychedelic drugs, and the wrong way of approaching Tool and their music. It is the key to understanding the RIGHT way to understand their message.

(Wow, my first proper thread. Hope someone finds this interesting enough to reply...)

[lizbiz]

Wow, you beat me to it. I was going to post something like this yesterday. I think your interpretation is right.

I would also like to add that this song, along with Hooker With a Penis, are the only Tool song's that specifically references products and icons of pop culture, past and present. This goes right along with your theory of the portrayal of an ignorant fan who swallows everything the media (or Tool) feeds to them.

[LetGoLetgoLetGo]

This has been mentioned before, but I do agree with the fact that a lot of TOOL "fans" dont take their music and use it as the band intends.

[asdf25]

Damn good post, best interpretation I've seen.

[somniferous]

"alrighty then, think of this a you will"..........good post

[somniferous]

*picture

[spacemonkeyadb]

Thanks guys! Glad to see I'm not completely out of my tree for interpreting this song the way I have. Cheers.

[MORNING_GLORY]

Well put... I think you deciphered the code. I remember the first time I heard this song... I thought it was about me... then I thought I was the chosen one and Tool was the E.T., but then I ran out of pot and realized half the other Tool fans felt the same way at first.

[Godin]

Well written post by Spacemonkey... one thing I want to address:


"I believe the song is deliberately ambiguous as to whether he actually was abducted or just thought he was due to the drugs."



"So, I light his way. Like an apparation, he had me calling out:

Fuck me. It's gotta be Deadhead Chemistry that's got me seeing E-muthafukin'-T..."


If this lyric is correct, or at least if the part from "Deadhead Chemistry" onwards is correct, then the song is unambiguous as to whether the alien encounter was a hallucination or not. Maynard is "calling out" through his lyrics in this song that the encounter was in fact from drugs.

It's the drugs that's fulfilled this character's fantasy by making him feel like he's "the chosen one", and of which is making him feel compelled to capture his drug induced message down in words "for all to see". He repeatedly fails to succeed in writing this message from the "aliens" down because whenever he comes down from his high the message flees from his memory as well.

Drugs often provide an individual with grand, seemingly world-changing insights, of which they are then compelled to jot down in writing. It's also typical, when one receives such profound states of consciousness, that they feel dignified by the message they have received and so they begin to believe that they themselves are meant to be a hero, a hero who is meant to transmit the drug-induced message for all to see in writing. Because of the passive state of reverie that most drugs put us in, we usually fail in doing anything productive while high -such as focusing our thoughts in order to write some profound consciousness. Continued instances of taking drugs to gain access to profound consciousness, and then failing to capture those perceptions down in writing, leads one to the ultimate result of "shitting the bed", of ruining the very place in your life where you'd usually find rest in. Just as Maynard suggests, this behavior is not rare but actually is "typical", for the ambitious literary types perhaps.

He lights our way out of this destructive pattern of behavior with the moral "Don't know, won't know".

-Godin

[spacemonkeyadb]

Interesting. Thanks for your thoughts. I still feel the song is ambiguous on this point though. The lyrics are always from the perspective of the story's narrator, and I don't see any point where Maynard takes us outside that view to a third person perspective to give us an objective comment on whether or not the aliens were real.
And from the perspective of the narrator, there are some points where he blames his experience on the drugs...

"It's gotta be deadhead chemistry...got me seein' E-mf-T!"

...and some parts where he seems to think the experience was real...

"Please believe what I just said...this wasn't all in my head"

I like this ambiguity, because it puts us as the listener in the same confused position as the character in the song, and makes it funnier by showing that this guy is really messed up and doesn't know WTF really happened.

(Note that I'm not claiming there is any ambiguity as to whether he was using drugs. That is certain. I'm saying the song is ambiguous between (i) he was tripping and THOUGHT he was abducted by aliens, and (ii) he was tripping but really WAS abducted.)

[Godin]

Interesting. Thanks for your thoughts. I still feel the song is ambiguous on this point though. The lyrics are always from the perspective of the story's narrator, and I don't see any point where Maynard takes us outside that view to a third person perspective to give us an objective comment on whether or not the aliens were real.



Oh no no no no no. Well... let me state a conditional, since I'm not CERTAIN of the lyrics until Maynard releases them officially.


"So, I [Maynard] light his way. Like an apparition, he [the crazy storyteller] had me calling out: etc..."

[He was] so alive this way, like an apparition he had me [Maynard] calling out: etc..."


If either of these two quotes are accurate, then there most certainly IS an outsider to the story who, in at least two separate times, provides commentary.

One of the two alternate above quotes is the first entrance of this outside persona, who we could associate as being Maynard's projected personality into the song. This part above is distinguished from the guy's alien monologue by a musical interlude. The quality of the musical interlude itself, to me, hints as if it is leading the listener to a type of transitional afterthought of the opening part of the story we just heard the monologue guy narrate.

In this first interruption, Maynard interrupts the guy's monologue to essentially say "so, considering how crazy we can clearly see this guy must be, I acted to him like an "apparation" (or a guiding spirit) and through my lyrics was informing him to stop misusing LSD." It's as if the entire moral to the song is essentially captured in this one little part.


The second intrusion of Maynard's persona into the song is when he simply interrupts the guy's monologue again and says "You'd better listen!". This simply suggests for the audience to think carefully about the contents of the song, but especially what comes up next.

It's also worth noting that, in concert and on the album, when Maynard sings the two parts of the song I've mentioned above he sings directly through the microphone. We may differentiate the monologue guy's voice in the song by him speaking through the megaphone.


-Godin

[Vondruke]

I think between spacemonkey and godin, and more humor and less of such a depth of meaning, then we are close to hitting it.

In other words, nobody is as clever (or not) as their words are interpreted and Maynard probably was going for the ideas expressed by the both of you but to start to parse 1st person narratives and 3rd person narratives etc. You are entering the hippy haze.
It's a funny story, sort of borrowing from the hippy 'Dave in the van' thing, then Maynard ties it into a different meaning. Analogy, it's a basic writing excericse, yet it's maybe the most effective, especially in rock and roll.

The brilliance of this song is that it's rather simple yet he threw some much shit into the stew, he stirred up enough mystery to make it so quintessentially 'tool'.
You don't know whether it's a ruse or a mystery. It's certainly part of both. In these ways we dont' disagree.

Just my take, I agree and disagree with what has been said. Some great thoughts, possibly totally correct but my bet is otherwise.

The idea here is strong and close to nailing it but yet still trying to find the esoterics in the obvious. He took a real story, made an analogy and knew people would 1-either be confused or 2-take it too deep and too far and I think Tool has always been about trying to speak to a different group. Trying to find those who can have a laugh and have a brain all on the same medium.To sum up, it's supposed to make you laugh and make a slight point, sort of like a South Park episode or whatever, it's not any deeper than that.

Perhaps that's what you are getting at. Maybe we agree after all....
And perhaps I drank too much whiskey tonight.
At any rate, this thread was the best thing I've read on this forum in a good while.

[spacemonkeyadb]

I can see how someone reading this thread might think that I've taken this song far too seriously, but I really don't think I have. I totally get the humor, and it was a long time before I could listen to this song without laughing out loud. I was just pointing out what I think is an intended second level of meaning for this song, and doing this didn't require me to mention the song's humorous aspect.

I think all Toolfans (myself included) have a tendency to expect too much from Tool and their music at times. We can be blinded by their musical and lyrical talent into forgetting that they are just regular humans like the rest of us. When this happens we become like the tripper in this song, and we "don't know/won't know" what Tool are really trying to tell us. Why? Because a large part of their message is that we should think for ourselves, and we are failing to do this once we start accepting as Gospel whatever the band may say. I'm sure Tool would want us to think just as critically about what they recommend to us through their music, as we would about our spiritual/religious beliefs.

[spacemonkeyadb]

"So, I [Maynard] light his way. Like an apparition, he [the crazy storyteller] had me calling out: etc..."

[He was] so alive this way, like an apparition he had me [Maynard] calling out: etc..."

If either of these two quotes are accurate, then there most certainly IS an outsider to the story who, in at least two separate times, provides commentary.

The second intrusion of Maynard's persona into the song is when he simply interrupts the guy's monologue again and says "You'd better listen!". This simply suggests for the audience to think carefully about the contents of the song, but especially what comes up next.

-Godin

Thanks for your take on those lyrics, Godin. Definitely given me something to think about.

I've been taking this line as...

"So alive in his way... (the alien)"
"like an apparition... (i.e. something scary)"
"he had me (the tripper) cryin' out.."

...so I didn't take this to imply the presence of a third party.

And I'd like to point out that the "You'd better listen" line works really well with my 2-level interpretation. At the literal level it's the alien telling the tripper to pay attention to his "message", and at the allegorical level it's Maynard telling us to pay attention to what he's really trying to say about how we should approach their music.

[mike09]

Yes, I have a similar view to this song. Obviously, on the literal level, the song is about a guy who may or may not have seen aliens and may or may not have been on drugs, etc. He was their messenger supposedly, etc.

On a deeper level, the song seems to me to be a satire of the whole image that a lot of Tool fans create of the band. They put them up so high like they're gods when they're really just like you and me and they just happen to make music that we love. The lyrics are deliberately unlike any other Tool lyrics. They're so blunt at times. I think this was done to stick it to their fans that expect them to write these deeply philosophical songs that have some secret kaballah/fibonacci connection or something. The lyrics are purposely made to piss off those kinds of fans. Just look at how many people have complained over the "goddamn, shit the bed" line. They complain about it because it's so "un-Tool". When in reality, Tool are really being themselves on this album and this song is really making fun of those "hardcore" Tool fans. IMO of course.

[DispReflTri78]

I agree completely.

[Godin]

...a satire of the whole image that a lot of Tool fans create of the band. They put them up so high like they're gods...stick it to their fans that expect them to write these deeply philosophical songs...purposely made to piss off those kinds of fans...this song is really making fun of those "hardcore" Tool fans. IMO of course.

That's the third time I've heard this take on the song... the take where it's claimed that Tool is critiquing their fans who look too much into their music. I'd love it if you would elaborate on your point by actually citing some parts of the song that make it obvious as to why you'd think such a thing. I, personally, see nothing in THIS SONG that you or anybody else could even come close to basing your "stick it to the over-zealous" claim on.

I do, however, see this theme in other songs, like "Ticks and Leaches" for instance.

-Godin

btw, what does "IMO" mean?

[spacemonkeyadb]

btw, what does "IMO" mean?

IMO = In My Opinion


That's the third time I've heard this take on the song... the take where it's claimed that Tool is critiquing their fans who look too much into their music. I'd love it if you would elaborate on your point by actually citing some parts of the song that make it obvious as to why you'd think such a thing. I, personally, see nothing in THIS SONG that you or anybody else could even come close to basing your "stick it to the over-zealous" claim on.


I suspect that mike09 and I see this song exactly the same way, yet for my part I'll say that I don't think the song is against "over-zealous" fans who "who LOOK too much into their music". I think it is rather targeting fans who EXPECT too much from their music and then AGREE with whatever they think the band is saying without giving any critical thought to it.
I think their is a lot of depth to Tool's music and lyrics, and I'm all for (over)analysing them, but I won't agree with whatever "message" I find just BECAUSE it's coming from Tool, and I don't expect them to solve all my problems or explain the entire universe to me.
(I certainly don't take this song to be critical of your approach to the album, Godin.)

As for "citing some parts of the song" to back up my interpretation, this isn't really possible. My second level of meaning for this song is an allegorical one, and allegory just doesn't work in a way that makes this possible.
(For those who don't know...) Allegory functions by using a fictional story with certain characters (e.g. the alien(s) and the tripper) and then deliberately depicting the relationships between those characters in a way that MIRRORS the (in this case satirized) relationships between other REAL-LIFE characters (Tool and their fans). When this is done the listener can then recognise this pattern of relationships and make a one-to-one substitution for the characters so as to identify the intended allegorical meaning.
If the song just came right out and stated that "alien"=Tool, and "tripper"=misguided fan, then there could be no allegory.

The relevant evidence then, with respect to my interpretation, is whether or not the pattern of relationships within the song is sufficiently similar to that of the relationships earlier described between Tool and a hypothetical fan to justify this as an intentional meaning for the song.
In my view it is, and I think my original post makes a good case for this.