The narrator himself is fictional, but is rather obviously patterned after singer Bruce Cockburn, whose "Lovers in a Dangerous Time" was covered by BNL as part of the Cockburn tribute album "Kick at the Darkness".
The first half of the song recounts a fictionalized version of Cockburn's visit to Guatemala (updated for the purposes of the song into a late 1990s Balkan war), and how it inspired his "If I Had a Rocket Launcher".
"This is where the helicopters came"
telegraphs this straight away by alluding to the first line of IIHaRL: "Here comes a helicopter, second time today".
The first half of "Helicopters" has the singer tagging along with a bevy of TV reporters covering a Kosovo-like conflict. The reporters see him as nothing but an opportunist:
"Here nobody takes me for a fool, just for a fake"
This interlude of tragedy and horror makes for quite a jarring addition to his routine as a performer:
"Just as soon as we were on the ground, we're back in the jet"
"Just another three-day foreign tour we'd never forget"
(shades here also of Cockburn's "Tokyo")
In the second half he is disheartened at how easily the press moves on from the war to the next "important" story.
"Though it's only half a month away, the media's gone"
"An entertaining scandal broke today, but I can't move on"
He tries to use his song to draw attention to the real tragedy of the situation...
"I'm haunted by a story and I do my best to tell it"
But "Helicopers" suggests that times have changed since Cockburn's era--the singer's efforts are greeted with ridicule. People have become so jaded that they assume he's just one more self-promoting windbag. He is indignant at this; after all, he hasn't profited by his choice of subject.
"Can't even give this stuff away, why would I sell it?"
The song suggests that no-one today would follow Cockburn's example because no-one dares to speak in earnest to a public that is incorrigibly cynical;
"A world that loves its irony must hate the protest singer"
and so the days of the protest singer have passed, possibly never to return.
The narrator himself is fictional, but is rather obviously patterned after singer Bruce Cockburn, whose "Lovers in a Dangerous Time" was covered by BNL as part of the Cockburn tribute album "Kick at the Darkness".
The first half of the song recounts a fictionalized version of Cockburn's visit to Guatemala (updated for the purposes of the song into a late 1990s Balkan war), and how it inspired his "If I Had a Rocket Launcher".
"This is where the helicopters came"
telegraphs this straight away by alluding to the first line of IIHaRL: "Here comes a helicopter, second time today".
The first half of "Helicopters" has the singer tagging along with a bevy of TV reporters covering a Kosovo-like conflict. The reporters see him as nothing but an opportunist:
"Here nobody takes me for a fool, just for a fake"
This interlude of tragedy and horror makes for quite a jarring addition to his routine as a performer:
"Just as soon as we were on the ground, we're back in the jet" "Just another three-day foreign tour we'd never forget"
(shades here also of Cockburn's "Tokyo")
In the second half he is disheartened at how easily the press moves on from the war to the next "important" story.
"Though it's only half a month away, the media's gone" "An entertaining scandal broke today, but I can't move on"
He tries to use his song to draw attention to the real tragedy of the situation...
"I'm haunted by a story and I do my best to tell it"
But "Helicopers" suggests that times have changed since Cockburn's era--the singer's efforts are greeted with ridicule. People have become so jaded that they assume he's just one more self-promoting windbag. He is indignant at this; after all, he hasn't profited by his choice of subject.
"Can't even give this stuff away, why would I sell it?"
The song suggests that no-one today would follow Cockburn's example because no-one dares to speak in earnest to a public that is incorrigibly cynical;
"A world that loves its irony must hate the protest singer"
and so the days of the protest singer have passed, possibly never to return.
"I'll be leaving soon"
@TheForbinProject great analysis
@TheForbinProject great analysis