Annotations for Uprising

Lyric: They will stop degrading us
Annotation:
degrading means to belittle o dehumanise others, something the UK government, which Muse is from, is known for.

Lyric: And hope that we will never see the truth around
Annotation:
This line states that the government hopes that the public will never notice the injustice and oppression around them.

Lyric: Rise up and take the power back
Annotation:
Power to the people, the idea that those with power are few and dangerous, that many with power would be a better world, perhaps an idea of anarchy. Matt’s vocals here are so enticing, so convincing, dripping with promise, matching the idealistic ideas of this world he sings about.

Lyric: They’ll try to push drugs that keep us all dumbed down
Annotation:
Dumbing down the people means they won’t ask questions, they won’t attempt to rise up against the corruption they face.

Lyric: The PR transmissions will resume
Annotation:
Public Radio Transmissions, that the government will keep giving out propaganda, and continuing paranoia.

Lyric: They will not control us
Annotation:
This line literally refers to the aforementioned misleading propaganda and pleasing distractions which contribute to making people easily controllable. Further interpretations are possible though: The term ‘control’ strongly alludes to trauma-based mind control, a theme faced by Muse in many occasions ( “MK Ultra”,  “Psycho”,  “The Handler” just to name a few): this statement stresses their committed criticism; Given that many songs on  The Resistance  are inspired by George Orwell’s  1984, said ‘control’ can be a reference to people surveillance against their will (“Big Brother is watching you”): a criticism to the risk of losing our privacy in the modern-day world, written in a period where social networks were about to take hold more and more.  Bellamy  used to change this lyric in live shows, singing They will not con-fucking-trol us: not only a way to emphasise its rage but a possible pun too, implying that they will not  troll us – typical  Muse dramatic humour. Moreover, during the band’s performance at the 53rd Grammy Awards in 2011 Matt accompanied this line with a well-known hand gesture conspiracy theorists call the ‘ Illuminati one eye sign’, giving the statement a conspirationist background.  However, although Matt’s fascination towards such theories has inspired numerous songs throughout the years, the extent of his real beliefs as a man, outside his character, is  up to speculation as suggested by himself.

Lyric: (So come on)
Annotation:
The line “So come on” is a call to arms by the narrator, essentially saying, “If you want the truth, then let’s go and fight for it”. This line is significantly drowned out by the guitar, which can be interpreted as representative of how their oppressive government is trying to silence them. It can be heard more clearly in this fan-made vocals-only video: https://youtu.be/j2vE8vQofLQ?t=13 The line is also repeated many times throughout the song, to remind the listener to get up and fight over and over and to let the message really sink in.

Lyric: Paranoia is in bloom
Annotation:
Compares the periodic fluctuations of paranoia to the seasonal bloom of flowers, conveying fear’s widespread and abundant presence in times of oppression. Interestingly (but perhaps unrelated) there is a hybrid orchid called the Odontonia Pacific Paranoia that is known to flower abundantly. This may relate to ‘Nineteen-Eighty-Four’ as the pacific island nations are under threat. More concretely, however, this may serve to provide the line with a literal interpretation in conjunction to the symbolic.

Lyric: We have to unify and watch our flag ascend
Annotation:
The line indicates a metaphorical flag that stands for power. According to Bellamy we, the people, have to unify in order to overcome the current tyranny, to be in control again, putting up the flag of the people, in place of the flag of their oppressors. It’s a throwback straight to the first line in this verse: Rise up and take the power back, away from the “fat cats”, rich banksters and corrupt politicians, unto ourselves. Actual flags showing the lyric “We will be victorious” and other symbols  were used in the procession that opened all concerts in the summer leg of the band’s tour in 2010, covering many european stadiums.

Lyric: It’s time the fat cats had a heart attack
Annotation:
No, but seriously, the “fat cats,” meaning the “white collar rich men that think they own our country because their wallets are thick,” need to have heart attacks, or die. Their death will make an easier takeover for the Resistance. “Heart attack” is also a reference to the shock associated with them, a sort of rude awakening. These “fat cats” need to realize that their fat wallets don’t put them in control. Moreover, heart attacks are frequently  caused by high levels of cholesterol, which is found in many fattening foods. Thus, “fat cats” has a double entendre here. A similar wish will be reiterated in the song  “Animals” included in the following album  The 2nd Law: Kill yourself Come on and do us all a favour

Lyric: If you could flick a switch and open your third eye
 You’d see that we should never be afraid to die
Annotation:
According to Muse, you were born with three eyes. Your two normal eyes can only see the propaganda and lies that the media puts in front of them. If you flip the switch inside your mind, you can open your third eye, and gain new perspective for the world around you; realize that this isn’t the way we should live life. Oppression is not absolute. Freedom is worth sacrifices.  Also, your pineal gland is often referred to as your “third eye.” Its the part of your brain that produces dimethyltryptamine (DMT) – a chemical that causes you to dream, among other things. It’s a small gland, but meditation is believed to increase its size and, at one point in the past, people thought it could become as big as an eye. It’s like your eye into the spirit realm… Once you become enlightened (flick the switch), you would no longer fear death because you already know what waits on the other side.  ‘Flick the switch’ could also refer to switching off the television, computer, phone, whatever it is that feeds you the lies.

Lyric: And endless red tape to keep the truth confined
Annotation:
‘ Red tape’ indicates bureaucracy and formality with a pejorative connotation, highlighting how it often seems purposeless or excessive: filling out forms, standing in lines, requesting and waiting, going to a different department. What Muse is pointing out here is the difficulty to get reliable information: you wait months or even years, and if you ever do finally get it, in some cases it’s redacted, blacked out, changed, come too late. They  say we can have it, but it’s still useless.

Lyric: And all the green belts wrapped around our minds
Annotation:
In the UK, where Muse are from, a ‘ green belt’ is a government scheme to create ‘belts’ of green land around cities that aren’t allowed to be built on or paved over in order to protect the environment. Given the  next line refers to ‘red tape’, another bureaucratic term, it seems as though the song is suggesting that by putting a ‘green belt’ around one’s mind, they are preventing any new ideas or beliefs to permeate – keeping the population dumb and trusting instead of endlessly building and rebuilding your beliefs based on new information.  This verse could also be a reference to Aldous Huxley’s dystopian novel  Brave New World, in which the government controls people by allowing them as much simple pleasure as possible to keep them numb to the existential problems of the world and their own uselessness. Part of the World State’s solution to this problem is to require all women to wear  Malthusian belts full of contraceptives so that they can have endless pleasurable sex without having to have the pain or responsibility associated with childbirth. One of the book’s main characters, Lenina, has her belt described this way: And around her waist she wore a silver-mounted green morocco-surrogate cartridge belt, bulging… with the regulation supply of contraceptives. While the green Malthusian belt was not actually wrapped around anyone’s head, its purpose was to allow for the kind of extended, unquestioning adolescence that can only be achieved by blissful ignorance, which was encouraged by one of the society’s mantras (with which all citizens were hypnotized): Work, play–at sixty our powers and and tastes are what they were as seventeen. Old men in the bad old days used to renounce, retire, take to religion, spend their time reading, thinking– thinking!  Another more intuitive interpretation sees ‘green’ standing for ‘money’ (from the color of dollar bills), so that ‘green belt’ means restraining the mind by making the focus on money, which links go the previous line “keep us trapped in greed”.

Lyric: Another, a packaged lie to keep us trapped in greed
Annotation:
Stimulus Packages, “free money from the government”. Money = Greed.  At the same time, this line’s hinting at how the government does so well at  hiding their lies. Almost every evil the government does has been perceived as something good at one point or another. Alternatively, a “packaged lie” refers to the products that we buy and how they never live up to what they are advertised as – so they are lies. This encourages us to buy more products out of greed to try and get what we want however they are all never good enough for total satisfaction.

Lyric: Another promise, another seed
Annotation:
More lies from the government, or the establishment. Matt is trying to convince us of the  true evil behind our system and our world leaders: a metaphorical ‘seed’ is planted in the minds of citizens to grow into false beliefs, hopes, ideals.

