Glimmering City (Dystopian Novel):

I remember the Apple commercial from 1984. I've read that it only aired twice, and was only broadcast once, during the Super Bowl, on national TV.

I had not read the novel Nineteen Eighty Four at that point, but I had gathered its general plot and meaning through popular culture.

Many dystopian stories, movies and the like have come and gone since 1984. This song is my attempt to add to that list.

You don't know how far I have come
Tunneled through the earth
Walked the burning sands
Swam across the river
To reach the Glimmering City where you live
On the hundredth floor

At first I had lyrics about overthrowing an oppressive dictatorship, but as the song developed I decided to imply that theme rather than state it outright.

You left your reflection in a broken mirror
I pieced it together and traced it here
I see your worried look so let me say
Why would you want to be normal anyway?

So the scene is a sleek, modern high-rise apartment. There's a beautiful girl living a comfortable life, tended by mechanical servants. There's a boy standing in front of her, looking somewhat dirty and wild. Is it a literal mirror that he refers to, or maybe an electronic device storing her image? I don't know. But the image of her face has moved him to action.

Leave these machines behind
Come join my rebel friends
We'll build a who new life from our bare hands
Leave these machines behind
Come join my rebel friends
We'll build a who new life from our bare hands...

I had written some sketchy lyrics using guitar, and I had a tune in my head. I made it pretty far in the songwriting process before I decided to start over with new music and re-written lyrics. The music had come out too somber. The lyrics were more angry than sweet and persuasive. 

I turned to the ukulele. I've found that ukuleles are usually dismissed as novelty instruments, but I think of mine as a simplified mandolin. It gives a song a small, rustic sound. 

After some trial and error, I found a chord progression that I had not played before: F to BbMaj7 to C. It was the airy Maj7 that opened up the song for me, letting in light and hope.

A common dystopian theme is the government strictly enforcing a bland existence, with few opportunities for pleasure, in order to control the masses.

However, as seen in Brave New World and Wall-E, it's much more effective to control a population by saturating the people with consumerism and entertainment. 

If a dystopian government really knows what it is doing, it will provide manufactured controversies in the news, constantly changing tastes in fashion and so on. It would be hard to tell the fictional news from the real thing, and the average citizen wouldn't know or care to know the difference. That's what's going on in the Glimmering City. 

So it's a hard sell for a young man with few possessions to arrive on the hundredth floor and ask this young woman to give up her luxurious life. He really only has one argument on his side: an emotional appeal to her sense of adventure and the unknown. 

When's the last time you felt cold?
When's the last time you felt scared?
When's the last time you felt alive?
Come take my hand, I'll lead you there...

I have always loved the song The Sounds of Silence, even when I was a little kid. It's funny to think that such a weird, dark, quiet song could have been popular on the radio in its own time. But it's that strange beauty that and storytelling that gets our attention, even today.

I had been reading the book of 1 Kings, where King Jeroboam commands that his workers make two golden calfs for the people to worship. It made be think of the neon god from Paul Simon's song, so I quote two lines in my song as a tribute.

And the people bowed an prayed
To the neon god they'd made
I hear security coming down the corridor
They're beating on the door, beating down the door!

Now the young man has made his case. Finally, there's a decision that needs to be made.

Leave these machines behind
Come join my rebel friends
We'll build a who new world from our bare hands...
Leave these machines behind
Come join my rebel friends
We'll build a who new life from our bare hands...