Vacuum Lyrics - In Flames

Dear reader, as you can understand Anders is a genius at writing lyrics, so I shall try and help you understand what this song means, line by line. Of course, I could be wrong in interpretation, but I believe one of Anders' tools that he uses to his advantage is subjective and objective interpretation. I will try and explain what Anders himself could have meant. I have tried to translate THEIR feel of the song without putting my own opinions or biased views on anything. (Ofc my interpretation is an opinion, but we shall see) Here it goes:

"The yesterday we loved speaks of tomorrow." - The time that has passed we yearned for, we enjoyed that time, and this will eventually happen in the future as well. We do not (really) enjoy the moment as it arrives but right after, things seem better in memory. This is hinting at a cyclical time-frame occurrence.

"The burden of man is that time never takes a pause. We live from Monday to Sunday but forget what it means." - These two lines go together, as we can understand. They both refer to time, the first line of the two clearly makes it axiomatic but I shall try to explain anyways. Time just goes and goes, and that's our burden. It never takes a pause, things happen so fast, but we sometimes take time for granted. Hence the "but forget what it means" - It means we are alive, we have life, the most precious gift of all.

"Then a ghost comes to visit and we tell stories from tabloids" - This is rather cryptic, but I believe I know what it means. "Then a ghost" - Perhaps death? "And we tell stories from tabloids" - News? So let me put it together, the entire stanza. You are living your life, taking time for granted, then a ghost (death) visits you and people are then telling stores and news about your death -> all your time is now gone. They're saying DONT TAKE TIME FOR GRANTED. (Recall Come Clarity from this album)

"Call all your friends watch fake photos from a made up vacation speaking in tongues about ancient artifacts" - This is an interesting piece here. This is hard to understand, but I will try to explain what I am thinking. Here, he uses words "fake" and "made up" so he's pointing to the transparency of mankind at times, being fake and just saying things to be accepted by peers.

"speaking in tongues about ancient artifacts" - This...is a strange line, but I do not think it's here for no purpose. Perhaps speaking this certain friend speaking about this made up vacation? Hmm...

"We steal from beggars and ask for understanding," - I separated this line up because its talking about two different things. This line is talking about how the government steals from beggars (tax) and, well, us in general, we're greedy and we do steal at times but we justify it under other pretences and etc. The next part of the line should be said with derision "and ask for understanding" let me rephrase it so you can understand. And you STILL dare ask for understanding after stealing from beggars? You see what they mean now? They're speaking about how haughty humanity is with their sins, and how in ruin and chaos justice is.

"lie, rape, steal and murder to make tonights headlines" - This is people trying to get attention by doing acts of evil, clearly being pushed into this by the former line, the thieves and the robbers of the world, and these evils mentioned in this line too. Everything affects everything, remember that.

"Trust the system, make your contribution, smile, applaud, love hail. The weaker you get the stronger they become" - Here, they are talking about how the government and the "system" is fucking you over, simply put. Remember, all of the characteristics they mentioned here are contributory (ass-kissing) characteristics. Fake smiles, fake applaud, fake love and fake hailing of other people to make contribute to society to satisfy our inherent greedy nature. They even (brilliantly) finish this off with a "The weaker you get the stronger they become" as in - The weaker you become to the enslavement of the system, the more those characteristics will take over your life, and the more real they will become. (Your contributions to the system, since, according to them [and it is] the system is fucking you over)

"Listen in silence, hear her voice
How far are we ready to take this?
Listen in silence, hear her voice
Before it all crumbles " - Many of you have had interesting interpretations of this, but to the theme of the song there is only one correct answer. "Her voice" is YOUR CONSCIENCE. Listen in silence, hear your conscience (they made it a 'her' because your conscience is precious, and beautiful, and fragile.) HOW FAR ARE YOU READY to take your evils? Your sins? Your wrong doings? How far are you ready to take this situation that you are in? Your lie, your rape, your theft? your murder? LISTEN IN SILENCE, BEFORE IT ALL CRUMBLES. Before your life shatters before your eyes because you cannot live with who you've become. Listen...in silence, and hear....her voice. Heed her voice.

"Gather in front of the TV. Exploding sympathy. The weatherman, our trust our punctual company " - Gather in front of the lie machine for your daily dosage of propaganda. People switch on the TV and watch the news and they suddenly have so much sympathy for the people who are being affected by "Lie, rape, steal and murder" yet they commit evils in their daily life. Ironic, no?

"The weatherman, our trust, our punctual company" - The talking man in the box is our trust, what he says we accept, because he's never wrong and he's always on time, in a suit, and like a father figure. We need not to fear.

NO. In Flames are saying BEWARE. BE VERY VERY CAREFUL. Propaganda is flying everywhere (on the tv especially) and you need to watch out what you listen for, what you do, where you go, how your own attitude is. They're asking you to listen to your conscience, and hear her voice....Before you take it too far.

P.S. In Flames are geniuses, and they are the best band to walk the face of the earth. I think In Flames fans are intelligent, because they are very very very good musically and lyrically. Thanks

Listen in silence, hear her voice... that means we better understand everything when we are alone...listen in silence HEAR UR VOICE!!!Ur opinion and ur thoughts and see the world how affect on u this world can be just some kind of immagination or dream we dont know YET!!!

I think the song's about government using mass media to prey on our emotions and use sympathy and manipulation to lead our thoughts so they can carry out w/e actions the deem necessary and that we allow them to do so.

i think this song describes our daily lives.it says that we dont live a life we chose but a life that society made us to and also we are gettting more and more stragers every day.my opinion........

I think this song is about how massmedia controls our lifes more of less. In one way or another we are all affected by massmedia and it's message.

"We live from Monday to Sunday but forget what it means. Then a ghost comes to visit and we tell stories from tabloids"

We tell stories from tabloids, that our lifes are controlled by the tv and suchs, so the thing we know is the thing we learn from massmedia.

"Listen in the silence, here her voice.
How far are we ready to take this?"

That has something to do with that much of what massmedia is today is crap, I mean Paris Hilton and such. Listen in the silence, all the crap that we see and here. How far are we ready to take this.. how long will it take until we realize that life aint about celebreties and their sexlife, which very much of what newspapers and so on publishes.

I dont really know, this is just my thoughts.
But I can clearly see how you that posted before connects it to mother nature. Anyway it's a great song from the worlds most awsome band!

I think those lines mean to listen to the voice of mother nature, Because we are destroying her and our planet will crumble if we dont listen to her and change what we are doing to the earth.

cool song.. great i mean^^ but can anyone tell what these lines mean?
Listen in silence, hear her voice
How far are we ready to take this?
Listen in silence, hear her voice
they hardly seem to fit into the message... plz help me^^

These lyrics accurately describe the ruin that is humanity today; we truly are lost in a vacuum.