In response to the songs about Utopias we heard in class today, I decided to post three songs from two of my favorite artists that focuses on post-apocalyptic imagery. However, rather than singing about the horror and devastation that arises from the end of the world, the artists romanticizes the idea of a cataclysm. This also reminds me of how the protagonist in “Take Your Choice” by Sakyo Komatsu chooses the apocalyptic future rather than the harmonious one because at least that choice promises certainty. Thus, it makes me think of how in a world of anxiety and uncertainty, the idea of apocalypse becomes appealing because it promises certainty and perhaps even a fresh start for humanity. One of the artists, Darlingside, describes a similar sentiment:

“One of the questions that came up as a consistent theme on the album was that of agency, or how much one can do in the face of seemingly insurmountable odds. That a song of ours might inspire someone to feel less powerless is lovely to hear…we do enjoy juxtaposing dark and light imagery. There’s something heartbreaking about finding bits of beauty in difficult places.” (from interview with Darlingside; see here: https://coloradosound.org/soundcheck/darlingside-qanda/)

The three songs with their lyrics are listed below. The first one is Wasteland, Baby by Hozier. The second and third ones are Singularity and Eschaton by Darlingside.

All the fear and the fire
Of the end of the world
Happens each time a boy falls in love with a girl
Happens grace
Happens sweet
Happily, I’m unfazed here, too

Wasteland, baby
I’m in love
I’m in love with you

All the things yet to come are the things that have passed
Like the old enough hands, like the breaking of glass
Like the bonfire that burns, in worth, in a fight felt too

Wasteland, baby
I’m in love
I’m in love with you
And I love too
That love soon might end
And be known in its aching
Shown in this shaking
Lately of my wasteland, baby
Be still, my indelible friend
You are unbreaking
Though quaking
Though crazy
That’s just wasteland, baby

And the day that we watch the death of the sun
That the cloud and the cold and those jeans you have on
That you gaze unafraid as they saw from the city ruins

Wasteland, baby
I’m in love
I’m in love with you
And I love too
That love soon might end
And be known in its aching
Shown in the shaking
Lately of my wasteland, baby
Be still, my indelible friend
You are unbreaking
Though quaking
Though crazy
That’s wasteland, baby

And the stance of the sea
And the absence of green
Are the death of all things that I’ve seen and unseen
Are men but the start of all things that are left to do?

Wasteland, baby
I’m in love
I’m in love with you
That’s it

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Someday a shooting star is gonna shoot me down
Burn these high rises back into a ghost town
Of iridium-white clouds
Matted close against the ground
While the sky hangs empty as a frame

See the reddening horizon line
Feel the planet spilling on the space time
On the way down Somerset I take pictures of cement
For the history books on Mother Earth

To the west now it begins
In the sound waves in the wind
There is an echo going by
Of the mountains caving in
And the parted roads and I
Knew that one day we would die
And become smooth and old again
Like the ash that sweeps the sky

Someday a shooting star is gonna shoot me down
Burn these high rises back into a ghost town

There’s holy water lying in the crater well
Heavy metals high test gasoline
Blessed singularity
A telescoping memory
Where the sky still flickers through the leaves

———————————————————————————————————————————-

You, me, the Young Turks by the BU Bridge
All of the lines are fixed

We need to remember what happens, if
We don’t write it who will?

Time, look at the time
And what we used to be
Signs, what are the signs?
Nobody here still reads

I hear the eschaton
I see our stripes on floating ground
No matter what we’ve been, we are the upshot now

I hear the eschaton
I see our stripes on floating ground
No matter what we’ve been, we are the upshot now

They’re making martyrs out of tennis stars
Did you think they were ours?

There’s something in the water, byzantine
And everyone’s downstream

Time, they own all the time
And what we used to be
Signs, look at the signs
Tell me what you believe

I hear the eschaton
I see our stripes on floating ground
No matter what we’ve been, we are the upshot now
I hear the eschaton

I see our stripes on floating ground
No matter what we’ve been, we are the upshot now
We are the upshot now

I hear the eschaton
I see our stripes on floating ground
No matter what we’ve been, we are the upshot now

I hear the eschaton
I see our stripes on floating ground
No matter what we’ve been, we are the upshot now