I don't see anyone on the same track as me, but nonetheless I think of the end of Ralph Ellison's book Invisible Man when I hear this (which I read for school). "It's not the secrets of the government that's keeping you dumb, no it's the other way around" sounds like a major theme at the end, since the populist organization he joins ends up being his greatest enemy, not necessarily the government. "He want it easy, he want it relaxed" reminds me of a scene where he has some difficulties with a woman named Sybil, for those who've read the book. The chorus makes some sense because after this scene he takes a long "walk outside" through NYC where there are riots and looting, the result of a failure to "keep down" the people of Harlem, then retreats "underground" into a manhole. "Can't you find some other guy?" could relate to the fact that he's been taken advantage of the entire book and gets pretty tired of that. Also, somewhere in the book he says that "the end is in the beginning yet lies further ahead." This statement is pretty vague (as is "the end has no end"), but both portray the same sense of perpetuity. Unfortunately the book does not take place in the 60s, although 1369, a scramble of 1963, is the number of lightbulbs his room is home to (that's a long shot). Overall I think it's interesting how many comparisons I found in my first few listens.
I don't see anyone on the same track as me, but nonetheless I think of the end of Ralph Ellison's book Invisible Man when I hear this (which I read for school). "It's not the secrets of the government that's keeping you dumb, no it's the other way around" sounds like a major theme at the end, since the populist organization he joins ends up being his greatest enemy, not necessarily the government. "He want it easy, he want it relaxed" reminds me of a scene where he has some difficulties with a woman named Sybil, for those who've read the book. The chorus makes some sense because after this scene he takes a long "walk outside" through NYC where there are riots and looting, the result of a failure to "keep down" the people of Harlem, then retreats "underground" into a manhole. "Can't you find some other guy?" could relate to the fact that he's been taken advantage of the entire book and gets pretty tired of that. Also, somewhere in the book he says that "the end is in the beginning yet lies further ahead." This statement is pretty vague (as is "the end has no end"), but both portray the same sense of perpetuity. Unfortunately the book does not take place in the 60s, although 1369, a scramble of 1963, is the number of lightbulbs his room is home to (that's a long shot). Overall I think it's interesting how many comparisons I found in my first few listens.