The second track on the album, A Beautiful Collapse, picks up at the very end of our human story. When we’ve failed for too long, and chosen to ignore science and the planet’s own desperate cries, we’ve hit the tipping point. The view of the universe who watches back in on itself as we appear and disappear as a tiny blip on the cosmic radar. Or maybe it’s from the viewpoint of a particularly nonchalant omnipotent being who watches from afar with a morbid curiosity as the last death throes of humanity shudder one last time. Destruction as a form of creation. A Beautiful Collapse.
Triumph and Disaster is available for pre-order now.
The video for A Beautiful Collapse is really different for We Lost The Sea. I also think the song is quite different for us too, compared to our back catalogue. It seems to have ended up with us making a statement of some kind. It was the editor, Aidan's, first go at doing something like this and his influences are quite socially and politically based. It was interesting to see someone else's take on the theme for this song. It follows a loose narrative showing our colourful and safe past that then moves on to a bleak and violent future.
The use of archival footage to tell a story was a way of referencing our common past to talk about what we have or are leaving behind. Other people's stories stitched together to create a collective narrative about our history and possible future. Also it's free to use, so that helps!
The idea behind using quotes from writers and thinkers, most of whom are dead, ties back into that human story. It's like little flashes of truths told by great minds that we should learn from. Things that have already been said that already predict or sum up so many relevant and current elements. A collective story of us that runs along with the song that tells of a foreshadowing, a collapse. How beautiful the things we make that we leave behind.
Are we intentionally ignoring their beauty in order to feel ok about moving on? A swing set, a colourful front door, children's toys, books, decorative cutlery, machine engines, art or anything handmade. Look at what we've accomplished, it's utterly amazing when you think about it. Now look at it all fade "buried under the dust and crying in silence like the ghosts of history."