Lyrics for God Is In The Radio as interpreted by ikari

God Is In The Radio Lyrics
I thought I saw him on the video
A trance is keeping him under
I know that god is in the radio
Checkin the station
A narcotic from me to you
Just a caught in the medium
I know you hear it, I hear it too
It's everywhere that I go

You come back another day
And you do no wrong

The say the devil is paranoid
Always trying to cover
But god is leakin through the stereo
Between the station to station
You believe it, I know you do
You won't admit it or say so
I know that god is in the radio
Just repeating the slogan

You come back another day
And you do no wrong
Come back another day
And do no wrong

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  • 37 Comments
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Slacker87564
09-17-2002

Rated 0 
no one has commented on this yet? this is one of their top songs if you ask me. its gotta be about how people these days seem praise the pop culture that is on the radio these and will listen to whatever they are told by the mainstream music stations. lines like "i know you hear it, i hear it too, its everywhere that i go" you cant seem to escape the "popular" song of a time. no matter what you'll hear it cuz its so over played. "you come back another day, and do no wrong" because some of these artists get that one hit song that may be good, and from there they just let go, and start mass producing garbage music just because they know they can get away with it and make money. definitely a great song musically and lyrically

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sunday_girl
03-03-2003

Rated 0 
Phwoar! this song is damn good, like slacker said, both musically and lyrically, like the whole album. Someone told me the other day that if you listen to the end of this track backwards, there's actually a hidden message there..i haven't had a chance to give it a whirl yet, but if someone knows what it is, let me know!!

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uncletommy
03-31-2003

Rated 0 
it's clear that there's backward speaking on it, kind of as a joke - just listen to the song, it's there

as for listening to it backwards, i dont have the technology, but from what ive been told, it's pretty abstract

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JesusChristPose
04-10-2003

Rated 0 
This is one of the best songs on SFTD. That said, this is a very creepy song. The begining with the piano, is just great. Heh, very strange song.

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Elin
04-14-2003

Rated 0 
What does he whisper in the end? Is that the part you can play backwards?

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uncletommy
04-30-2003

Rated 0 
yeah, someone said played backwards it was something like "over my shoulder.." and more, but i cant remember

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moe2000
05-03-2003

Rated 0 
doesn't anybody just see what it's about at face value? "god is in the radio", the broadcast just before switching from one religious show to another? don't you get it, it's about all these religious shows on the radio, everywhere. "the say the devil is paranoid" "but god is leaking throiugh the stereo / between station to station". they're broadcasting their religious proaganda everywhere, and mark lanegan can't seem to escape it.

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uncletommy
05-05-2003

Rated 0 
yeah, you may have a point. it doesnt jump out at me, because im in the UK and we dont get really have any religiously-motivated radio stations

i can see your point definately, i hadnt thought about it before. so, i guess it's aimed at the clear-channel corporation - a bunch of right-wing religious extremists running almost all the radio networks in the US. and advertising too - "Just repeating the slogan "

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zaphodbeeblebrox42
06-09-2003

Rated 0 
The first interpretation of this song makes sense, since it fits in with the whole modern-radio-plays-crappy-music motif of the album. However, I had intepreted it the same way as moe2000, as a more straightforward song. It's a great song no matter which way you look at it.

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gunda
04-19-2004

Rated 0 
I think it's to do with the corporations that own the radio stations using it to tell us what to do. When it's not playing the "cool" music of the moment and telling us whats cool like slacker said, it's advertising junk and telling us what to buy. It's a concept album. It rips on the radio all the way through.

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6bit
06-25-2004

Rated 0 
"They say the devil is paranoid " is a great line, particularly if the backwards message is "looking over my shoulder", because traditionally, backwards masking on albums is said to be a "message from the devil", where as here- they build on his paranoia, making him say he is looking over his shoulder. its great.

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queensfan123
10-01-2004

Rated 0 
yeah 6bit has an interesting point. I've listened to the backwards bit and it's wacked out. 'look over your left shoulder' 'i'm in erics room' 'you're in the palm of my hand' those are some of the backwards lyrics. pretty fucked up. just for fun try playing this song to people and watch them glance over their left shoulder. i've tried it on a few people and it works so far.

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Potatoes9000
10-02-2004

Rated 0 
time to overanalyze the backwards part. left shoulder is considered a sign of the devil. that's why you throw salt over your left shoulder--to supress the devil.

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forthelove
11-08-2004

Rated 0 
I think the people who say its straightforward are right. It seems to me, now looking at it yet again, that the song is about religious radio broadcasting. I don't think its just that general though. The way its contextualized with the snippets of religious broadcasting seems to say something about radio evangelism. Discussion of Christian theology isn't represented...just "preaching"...which seems to echo the "just repeating the slogan" part. The song says that radio evangelism, much like its tv counterpart has boiled down an entire belief system into a slogan that can be re-worded and repeated over and over...and as such, its both inescapable and ineffectual at once. In other words "God's in my radio...I hear him all the time...but he's not really saying anything..."

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ieatalotoftacos
01-04-2005

Rated 0 
Maybe the whole religious broadcasting thing is correct, especially following the whole concept album thing the band was going for. But nobody's mentioned how the radio has that moral authority looking over them: the FCC. If you look at how they censor everything, in a moral way, then that's where you'd see God in this song.

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Thunderbolt
03-20-2005

Rated 0 
I think it's pretty clear it's simply a bag on religious broadcasting, because the song is preceded by the very stereotypical religious broadcaster.

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ChiliChild
06-02-2005

Rated 0 
Great catchy pulse! And lots of blues... Love it

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Pellucid
02-17-2006

Rated 0 
I think the religious broadcasting idea is more than likely wrong. First of all, religious broadcasting isn't all that prolific. Second of all, I've yet to hear a Queens of the Stone Age song that turned out to be about exactly what it looked like it was about on face value.

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N0 C0DE 79
02-17-2006

Rated 0 
Exactly... look at I Never Came...

on the surface, it just seems like a standard song about relationship troubles....

Little do we know it's actually about masturbation....

or maybe Josh is just thinking dirty in the video...

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Qotsa-in-my-blood
07-30-2006

Rated 0 
Its a decent song at best.

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Black Sativa
10-23-2006

Rated 0 
It's about religious broadcasting. Stop over-analyzing something that's clear at face value, but very ambiguous when you try and look for alternate meanings. You're all as bad as the people who go on about Creep by Radiohead - there's 200 odd fucking comments there and it's blatant what it's about.

Right... Anyone know what the whispering is in the interlude? This song kicks ass.

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Chris R
11-07-2006

Rated 0 
This song goes very very well with the whole theme of the album. The radio intervals between the songs are fake "Shortwave/AM" Broadcasts. These usually consist of Pirate Radio, and Religious broadcasts. This song is talking about how God is over the radio. Pick up a Shortwave radio and hear for yourself.

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KuЯtains
01-16-2007

Rated 0 
I don't believe it's as straight forward as "Religious Radio", with intelligent artists it never is.

I think it's just influences from the media, and how we eat from their palms. They have us wrapped around their little fingers, in face... We believe everything they say.

Just like religious people do with their gods.

Tadah

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kittieroxsohard
02-14-2007

Rated 0 
how do you play it backwards?

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Debaser19
06-12-2007

Rated 0 
Fuck I love this song! This my fave off songs for the deaf. Mark Lanegan has an amazing voice too. Its such a heavy song and the guitar solo is great.

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