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Globus – Europa Lyrics 12 years ago
I love Immediate Music and Globus, and the music is breathtaking. The lyrics for this one, though, really do not sit well with me. It's not a call to end war. It's a rather incongruous list of all the bloodshed of Europe's history (which is true) mixed with declaring a new religious war and calling for divine help in said war.

This stanza clearly lays out the "western world" vs. "insurgents.. on our shores". Unfortunately, I take that to mean immigrants. (Europe has even bigger anti-immigration issues than the US does at this point.)

"Of new crusades, religious wars
Insurgents imported to our shores
The western world, gripped in fear
The mother of all battles here"

This clause is an obvious reference to terrorism. Which would be OK if it was condemning it, but the first line suggests "the children of those we threw out". Which makes it a revenge attack?

"Decendants of the dispossessed / Return with bombs strapped to their chests"

The caliphate reference here is blatantly a Muslim reference:

"There's hate for life, and death in hate / Emerging from the new caliphate"

And of course "the bomb" in this case is obviously nuclear:

"Drop the bomb, end this fight! / Never again!"

And yet the Never Again line is completely out of place. That's generally taken as a reference to the Holocaust, and a call to *end* racism and genocide. To use that line immediately after a call to nuclear war is... weird at best.

Were the song a call for divine intervention to finally put an end to war and bloodshed, I'd be fine with it. But it's not. I see it very clearly as a call for divine intervention in yet-another religious war, to ensure (Christian?) Europe's dominance for the next thousand years. And then it mixes in a 20th century please for peace at the end.

I almost wish it could make up its mind. A song that is all "ra-ra Europa, let's kick ass in the world" I could deal with. One that calls on the goddess of Europe to put and end to 2000 years of bloodshed I could deal with. But switching back and forth like that, especially in an openly racist fashion, well, just doesn't sit well and is not up to the amazing nature of the music behind it.

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