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Something for the rag and bone man
Over my dead body
Something big is gonna happen
Over my dead body
Someone's son or someone's daughter
Over my dead body
This is how I end up sucked in
Over my dead body
I'm gonna go to sleep
Let this wash all over me
We don't want to wake monster taking over
Tiptoe round, tie him down
We don't want the loonies taking over
Tiptoe round, tie them down
May pretty horses
Come to you
As you sleep
I'm gonna go to sleep
Let this wash all over me
Over my dead body
Something big is gonna happen
Over my dead body
Someone's son or someone's daughter
Over my dead body
This is how I end up sucked in
Over my dead body
I'm gonna go to sleep
Let this wash all over me
We don't want to wake monster taking over
Tiptoe round, tie him down
We don't want the loonies taking over
Tiptoe round, tie them down
May pretty horses
Come to you
As you sleep
I'm gonna go to sleep
Let this wash all over me
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The monster that waits for you to go to sleep so it can sneak up on you unhindered and savage you. Basically being afraid to go to sleep because you're afraid of what will happen when you sleep, be it ridiculous nightmare monsters sneaking up on you or realistic, really awfully bad political changes that make the world an absolute nightmare to live in, like 1984 or something.
There's also the thought that when it comes to the world, so many people are asleep to these kind of real dangers. The cheese fell off their crackers a long time ago. If you're aware, its even harder to sleep and relax thinking about the threats to our peaceful lives, because you might be one of the only ones on watch.
Then, sleep is so comforting. Its just a better world. So if the monster comes along and makes sure you never wake up, who gives a shit? You're at peace forever. Some prefer to have peace. Some prefer to fight. This song looks at both.
By the way, never search 'Go To Sleep' on Google Images. You won't sleep for a while.
Of course 2 + 2 = 5 is inspired by 1984, but this song is even more!
The main character (winston) was locked up in the Ministry of Love, waiting for torture and death. He knew he was going to die. Some things happened when locked up:
Something for the rag and bone man: Winston gave a starving man a piece of bread, but he wasn't allowed to do that.
Someone's son or someone's daughter: Parson (another person) was sent to the 'jail' by his daughter/son, because he said some anti-governmental things. And that's how he got sucked in the 'jail'.
Both the 'We don't want the..' parts are explanations why anti-governmental people should be tortured and killed. Those are told when Winston was being tortured.
Winston wanted his torturers (is that even a word) to be haunted by the visions of his body and their bad deed as revenge.
Sorry for bad english!
"Something for the rag and bone man" : A small thing to be outraged about, yet the response is "Over my dead body"
"Something big is gonna happen": Scaremongering, again the response is "Over my dead body!"
"Someone's son or someone's daughter": The classic "think of the children" approach, "OVER MY DEAD BODY!"
"This is how I get sucked in": Sucked in by appeal to emotion, by "Over my dead body!"
"I'm gonna go to sleep, let this wash over me"; sleep on it to avoid making rash decisions.
"We don't want a monster taking over" .. etc: once you've got people all fired up, they are ready for action.
"may pretty horses come to you in your sleep": sleep nice happy sleepy sleeps, forget all about it.
Thom has said himself in various interviews that "Hail To The Thief" was partially inspired by his (rather recent for that time) epiphany with how the political system works. And he was just enraged by it. He didn't like the idea that a whole group of people must somewhere taper down to one administrator, and essentially stiff everybody. I mean, that's a general discontent he had with it. He just didn't like all the "bullshit," the needless mumbo jumbo that's hurting people instead of helping them.
Point is, it's not fucking about Bush. Thom lives in Britain. Why the fuck would he feel so affected by American politics? This album has a personal touch to it. It's not a complete outward statement about politics. Thom 'aint a protester, yuh heard.