The Flesh Failures / Let The Sun Shine In

The finale, "The Flesh Failures" summarizes the themes of the show, particularly the insanity of war and our consumerist culture, obsessed with comfort as people are being murdered in southeast Asia. We pass each other on the street, bundled up in our designer clothes, created and purchased specifically to display our level of wealth and success, too busy to stop and connect to each other, too busy to help the homeless lying on the street, too preoccupied with our superficial lives, our appointments, our scramble to accumulate possessions (a theme Hair�s descendent Rent would return to). The song tells us that somewhere inside, buried beneath all this, hidden deep down, there is greatness in the human race, that we have such potential, but that we have failed. We have failed by succumbing to comfort, to the demands of the flesh, instead of aiming for something higher. Claude comes forward, now dead, killed in Vietnam, invisible to the tribe � just as returning Vietnam vets were "invisible" in American culture � and as he reprises his theme song, "Manchester England," the tribe sings in counterpoint "Eyes Look Your Last," a musical setting of a speech from Romeo and Juliet. The words are Romeo�s, after he finds Juliet�s (apparently) dead body, and just before he takes his own life. The last line of this section, "the rest is silence," is Hamlet�s last line before dying at the end of Hamlet. We are killing ourselves, the tribe is telling us. After another verse of "The Flesh Failures" the show finishes with "Let the Sun Shine In."

But "Let the Sun Shine In" is not the happy song most people think it is. It�s a call to action. The tribe is begging us, the audience, to change things, to stop the killing, the hatred, the discrimination, the destruction of our world. They are saying that we are in a time of darkness (as described in detail by "The Flesh Failures," "Easy to Be Hard," and other songs), that it is now time to let the sun shine in and change things. It�s significant that the lyric doesn't say that the sun is already shining and everything is going to be fine. It says we have to take action, we have to let the sun shine on the darkness around us, and the implication is unmistakable � if we dont, it will be the end of us. From: orlok.com/hair/holding/articles/HairArticles/scottmiller.html