“This Species Has Amused Itself To Death”

…one thing leads to another…

Amused to Death 

Roger Waters

Doctor Doctor what is wrong with me 
This supermarket life is getting long 
What is the heart life of a colour TV 
What is the shelf life of a teenage queen 

Ooh western woman
Ooh western girl 
News hound sniffs the air 
When Jessica Hahn goes down 

He latches on to that symbol 
Of detachment 
Attracted by the peeling away of feeling 
The celebrity of the abused shell the belle 

Ooh western woman 
Ooh western girl 
And the children of Melrose strut their stuff 
Is absolute zero cold enough 

And out in the valley warm and clean 
The little ones sit by their TV screens 
No thoughts to think 

No tears to cry 
All sucked dry 
Down to the very last breath

Bartender what is wrong with me
Why am I so out of breath 
The captain said excuse me ma’am 
This species has amused itself to death

Amused itself to death 
Amused itself to death 

We watched the tragedy unfold 
We did as we were told 
We bought and sold 
It was the greatest show on earth 

But then it was over 
We ohhed and aahed 
We drove our racing cars 
We ate our last few jars of caviar 

And somewhere out there in the stars 
A keen-eyed look-out 
Spied a flickering light 
Our last hurrah 

And when they found our shadows 
Grouped around the TV sets 
They ran down every lead 
They repeated every test 

They checked out all the data on their lists 
And then the alien anthropologists 
Admitted they were still perplexed 

But on eliminating every other reason 
For our sad demise 
They logged the only explanation left 
This species has amused itself to death

No tears to cry no feelings left 
This species has amused itself to death

Voiceover:

“Years later, I saw Bill Hubbard’s name on the memorial to the missing 
at Aras. And I…when I saw his name I was absolutely transfixed; it 
was as though he was now a human being instead of some sort of 
nightmarish memory of how I had to leave him, all those years ago. 
And I felt relieved, and ever since then I’ve felt happier about it, 
because always before, whenever I thought of him, I said to myself, 
‘Was there something else that I could have done?’ 

“I’d rather die, I’d rather die…” 

And that always sort of worried me. And having seen him, and his 
name in the register – as you know in the memorials there’s a little safe, 
there’s a register in there with every name – and seeing his name and 
his name on the memorial; it sort of lightened my…heart, if you like.” 

“When was it that you saw his name on the memorial?” 

“Ah, when I was eighty-seven, that would be a year, ninete…eighty- 
four, nineteen eighty-four.” 

Source: LyricFind 
Songwriters: Roger Waters 
Amused to Death lyrics  Warner/Chappell Music, Inc, BMG Rights Management US, LLC, Sony/ATV Music Publishing LLC