What exactly is the connection between “sun of nothing”, “swim to the moon” and the new parallax records? I’m very curious as to how they tie together. — kurt906 sun of nothing is separate. swim to the moon happens right before the ep. its the character that crashes on an island. between swim and the ep is “bloom”. he, [Prospect 1], goes down to an underwater village and dances… actually he gets tested on and brought back to life. what the hell is wrong with me. — Tommy Rogers

Pretty crazy so far, but after taking this into consideration, and then looking at the lyrics, it all makes perfect. You know, relatively speaking.

The beginning of the song is obviously taking place at the very end of ‘Swim to the Moon’. Prospect 1 is just about to die, and as his body is floating out to sea, tentacle-clad beings grab him and pull him down to the depths below for the sake of “singing” and “dancing”. Through the song we also learn that the being responsible for taking Prospect 1 is something called ‘Queen Sea’, maybe a physical manifestation of the sea, or… I don’t really know. The being promises to take care of our character, but she does so by taking away his pesky oxygen, and conducting experiments on him, making him dance and sing to her cruel melodies.

Eventually Queen Sea apparently resurrects Prospect 1. His life appears to be quite important after all, and the lyrics are written almost apologetically, having Queen Sea say, ‘Queen Sea will give back life/We used you/Your purpose is clear/We never knew’. The implications of this are pretty obvious, and coincide with what we know about Prospect 1, he’s an important dude. It’s why we’ve listened to nearly an hour and a half of music about his and Prospect 2’s life, but it’s a bit more stunning to hear it from another source, another character pretty much saying,”Oh shit, you have a higher purpose than being our lab rat, here, have your life back.”

The end of the song presents the unspoken line ‘(Tentacle hearse transportation… Actual happenings or the distant mind?)’. We already know that both Prospects occasionally have trouble differentiating between real life and dreams, and up until this point we have had no mention of these underwater happenings. The easy answer to this is that Tommy and the gang just hadn’t come up with this plot point yet, and once they had, they felt compelled to include it in the story, and while that may be true, there might also be another reason for it within the context of the plot. The last song we examined was ‘Telos’, or ‘The Decision’, and after discussing that song we found out quite a few things, namely the fact that Prospect 2 wants to destroy Prospect 1’s planet, and all of mankind. We also learned that Prospect 1 wasn’t too keen on this idea, and had decided to depart from Prospect 2’s life — to do what, we don’t really know. I would posit that the reason this part of the story, ‘Bloom’, is being brought up here in such a chronologically displaced manner is in order to remind the audience that Prospect 1 is important, and that he does have a purpose, and that leaving Prospect 2 probably won’t be the best decision. Whether it was real or not? We don’t know, and that’s kind of the point of the song. So let us continue.

Melting City

The second half of this album really is the weirdest thing. We’ve already seen the return of the Night Owls in ‘The Black Box’, the planned destruction of mankind in ‘Telos’, and a man being tortured underwater while being forced to sing and dance for some unknown creature. Now in ‘Melting City’, things just get weirder. Lost love, black boxes, death, and an unknown character who is so very crucial to the story, yet is given absolutely no back story or clarification as to who or what he is. Yeah, sounds like something BTBAM would include.

[The Black Mask:]

Creep in

Before the rise of the sun

Execute a story never told

Do not think

Just do

No human emotion

Who says I’m even human at this point?

A poor example of life

No morals

Just a huge display of direction

Hear, then do

Profit

The song begins and immediately takes place from the point of view of a character we have not been introduced to, simply referred to as The Black Mask. The first couple of lines tell us that The Black Mask is going to be taking part in a section of the story that has never been told, not an incredible feat by any means, as the Parallax story is barely a few years old, but it’s still an important line, and it lets us know that some new information is going to be imparted to the audience. We also get a little bit of characterization for The Black Mask. He questions his humanity, saying that he has no real emotion left, or any sense of self, as he just hears and then does, for his own personal profit.

Sneak in the box before the rise of the sun

A four-handed bed occupied by only two

The window is yawning

This part connects ‘Melting City’ to ‘Telos’, where a similar line to ‘A four-handed bed occupied by only two’ was spoken by Prospect 2’s wife during the flashback sequence. At the beginning of the song we hear the line ‘Creep in/ Before the rise of the sun’, and this stanza has an accompanying line,’Sneak in the box before the rise of the sun’. Once again we are given a reference to a box. The first being the song ‘The Black Box’, and the second being ‘Telos’, again coming from the point of view of Prospect 2’s wife. Whereas ‘The Black Box‘ referenced a weapon of incredible power, Prospect 2’s wife was merely referring to her empty home. At this point we can connect some dots, and posit that The Black Mask has snuck into the home of Prospect 2’s wife, once again placing the beginning of this song a bit out of chronological order for the album.

Faceless in a sea of space

My propulsion from their pain In, out

Profit

Why would they need me for a simple confession?

Collect, then destroy

Collect, then destroy

Before the rise of the sun

Here we see the The Black Mask ask himself ‘Why would they need me for a simple confession?/ Collect, then Destroy/Collect, then Destroy/Before the rise of the sun’, implying that he was sent on a mission by unknown persons in order to extract a confession from the home of Prospect 2 and his wife. We only know of one confession that would have any real weight to the story of The Parallax, and that being the one Prospect 2 left for his wife after he left his home, a letter detailing his reasons for leaving.

So after given very little information, we can actually piece this together pretty well. We know from the majority of the first half of Future Sequence that Prospect 2 put a lot of emphasis on his letter, as it was his only source of comfort, allowing him to feel a small amount of ease at knowing that his wife would receive the letter, and understand his decisions for leaving and all of his subsequent actions. We also know that in ‘Extremophile Elite’ Prospect 2 found a similar if not exact letter to the one he wrote on the person of Prospect 1, signifying to him that his letter never reached his wife. Up until this point we had no knowledge as to why it didn’t reach his wife, but further evidence to support the fact that it didn’t reach her was shown in ‘Telos’, when we saw the aftermath of Prospect 2’s departure from the point of view of his wife. So here we are back in the context of ‘Melting City’, and we finally learn why Prospect 2’s wife was never able to read his letter; this new character, the Black Mask, was hired by some unknown entity to creep into their house — presumably immediately after Prospect 2 left, as his wife is still asleep — and collect Prospect 2’s confession, and then destroy it. We still don’t really know WHY this is happening, but at least we know what is going on.

Faceless in a sea of space

My propulsion from their pain

This is the second instance of these lines of lyrics, not only do they tie into the theme of space and future nonsense, it’s really only here to further illustrate that The Black Mask isn’t a very moral, or emotionally sympathetic character. He is faceless because he feels no remorse or any other sort of emotion for his actions, and his propulsion from their pain is him doing the job he was hired for, and high tailing it out of the house as fast as possible, distancing himself from the hurt that will ensue once the wife realizes that she is now alone.

Years Later:

Frantic writing

Not meant for my eyes

Why did I keep this? What inside forced me to see the ink?

Smoothed out, then in pieces.

I can’t live with this

I must let her know

This stanza of lyrics is particularly important as it shows a shift in the character of The Black Mask. Years after his job we find out that he didn’t destroy the confession like he was supposed to, but instead kept it, and after many years he has decided to read it. He doesn’t know why he read it, or why he even kept it, as he realizes it wasn’t meant for his eyes — Well, you did steal it, maybe that should have been an indication that it wasn’t meant for you, Mr. Black Mask. Eventually, disheveled by what he has read in the letter, he decides to inform Prospect 2’s wife of what he has read, and what he has done, in an attempt to right the wrong he has committed. Even though this part takes place a few years after the beginning of the song, it is still in a bit of chronological fuckery, as Prospect 2’s wife is still alive during these events — we know from ‘Telos’ that she died even before the destruction of Prospect 2’s planet at the end of Hypersleep Dialogues, so these events in ‘Melting City’ must be happening some time ago.— evident by the line ‘I can’t live with this/ I must let her know’.

A valley of smiling despair

Self doubt would be my first guess

Confusion, sadness, the other half

But lost through selfish measures

I can’t live with this

I must let her know (One heart in a two heart bed. She woke to nothing. Because of me, she woke to nothing.)

This stanza appears to be The Black Mask ruminating on what the Wife must be feeling due to the loss of her husband. We know from ‘Telos’ that after his departure that the Wife tried to go about her normal life, putting on a facade for those around her, which is illustrated here with the line, ‘A valley of smiling despair’. He goes on to say that she probably feels a sense of self-doubt, and confusion, possibly blaming herself for what has happened. He resolves to end this by letting her know everything, as he cannot live with himself any longer.

The robot has stepped out of his box

Foreigner in my own land

No profit

For once no profit

Walk in

After the rise of the sun

Conclude a story never read

A burning smell creeps up my nostrils (the box is gone)

A trapdoor locked from the inside

Incomplete me

Impossible conclusion

Me Faceless in a sea of space

My propulsion from their pain

And here we see the final results of everything that has befallen the Wife. The stanza begins with the line ‘The robot has stepped out of his box’, referring to the Black Mask himself, as he stated earlier in the song that he was devoid of all human emotion, and this line signifies that he, the robot, has finally stepped out of his cold shell, and has allowed himself to do something human for once. The line ‘Foreigner in my own land’ refers to the fact that now that he has had a change of heart, he now feels like an outsider. The change of heart is further illustrated by ‘No Profit/For once no profit’, he is finally acting out positive human emotions, instead of rely solely on greed. The song states that he has come back to the house after the rise of son, whereas before he came before the rise of the sun. This is just to show that he was hoping to catch the Wife while she was awake, instead of before where she was sleeping.

Unfortunately things have taken a turn for the worse, but the audience is already aware of these events. As this part of this story is concluding, we see that The Black Mask has smelt a burning scent creeping into his nostrils, we of course know from ‘Telos’ that this is because the Wife has decided to burn herself alive inside her home. This stanza concludes with the lines ‘Incomplete me/ Impossible conclusion/ Me’. These lines are saying that because The Black Mask wasn’t able to inform the Wife of his actions, and her husband’s letter, this part of the story can never be resolved. She has died, and it his fault, and once again The Black Mask flees from this house propelling himself away from the scene of a great tragedy.

Silent Flight Parliament

Here we are, the last full song on Future Sequence, and boy is it a doozy. Coming in at just over fifteen minutes in length, it is one of the longest BTBAM songs to date. I could spend a long time giving an eloquent introduction to this song, but that’s pretty unnecessary, so let’s just jump into this one.

[Prospect 2:]

I know what I must do

I’m coming home

Once again we see this song taking place from the point of view of Prospect 2. This is a small, simple stanza, but it holds a lot of weight. Here we can assume that Prospect 2 has finally decided to utilize the precaution documents as mentioned in the song ‘Lay Your Ghosts to Rest’, because of the line ‘I’m coming home’. He has finally decided to end his mission that he has taken part in since the beginning of the Parallax story, the sowing of human life. In my analysis of ‘Lay Your Ghost to Rest’ I mentioned the reluctance of Prospect 2 to utilize the contents of Folder 502, and asserted that this sort of reluctance shows that the options laid out in those folders must be something drastic, and now I think we can assume that what lay inside are the means to destroy humanity, which was Prospect 2’s plan as mentioned in ‘Telos’. This is pretty clear at this point because there is no way for Prospect 2 to really go home, as his planet has been destroyed, so his idea of going home would be to die like his loved ones and everyone on his planet.

Strigiformes:

Fixed socket threat

Binocular vision

I see all

I hear all

Superior intellect

I’m the night owl

Built by the alien gods

A necessity to the existence of all life

Fixed socket threat

Binocular vision.

I see all

I hear all

I’m the night owl I return in the day but you won’t ever see me

Only my eyes

The blaring yellow sphere

A sharp distortion

The TV screen you stare at night after night

Over and over You are staring into me

Cut the wires and cut your ties

You aren’t what you think

An experiment

They will send us to warn, but that’s part of the game as well

Fucking weaklings

These are some of my favorite lyrics on Future Sequence, not because they are especially poignant or eloquent, but because of how fucking badass they are. In these lines we get to hear the voice of the Strigiformes, and they seem pretty fucking vicious. Even though these lyrics outright say that the Strigiformes are the Night Owls, I still wanted to make sure I understood what the word meant:

strig·i·form [strij-uh-fawrm] adjective of, pertaining, or belonging to the order Strigiformes, comprising the owls. — dictionary.com

Okay, good. BTBAM are just using Strigiformes as a synonym for their alien creatures, The Night Owls, whom we already know as the creatures that have been watching over and guiding mankind’s actions since their inception, as outlined in the song ‘Fossil Genera’. The lyrics here are simply explaining things we already know; The Night Owls are a seemingly all-knowing order of creatures, built by unknown alien gods, and they guide humanity’s existence. I’ve seen people focusing on the lines about TV quite a bit, and I don’t see the fuss. I just think it’s there to say that The Night Owls have a lot of ways of spying on people, to further solidify the fact that they see all and hear all.

The final stanza during this part is the most telling, but also kind of confusing. I don’t know if they are talking to Prospect 2, or humanity as a whole, but maybe that’s inconsequential as well. Either way we learn that Prospect 2 — and likely humanity as a whole — was merely an experiment for the Night Owls’ own ends. All of these events that have unfolded in this story, including their warnings — which was once again talked about in ‘Fossil Genera’ — were just a part of the Night Owl’s game. They end their speech with a resounding insult clearly aimed at humanity, ‘Fucking Weaklings‘. Heavy stuff.

[Prospect 2:]

I still know what my mind tells you to do

Cut out pieces to form new

Here Prospect 2 is still having small twinges of doubt and confusion. Even though he said he had resolved to come home, his instincts still tell him to continue on with his self-mutilation, in order to reform himself.

Am I me?

What is he? It’s come to the point of opening the box

Carved in the side are the words: Property of the Night Owls.

Smash to unlock the desperate measures.

And here we see yet another reference to The Black Box. In part IV of this analysis I hypothesized that the speakers in the song ‘The Black Box’ were the Night Owls, and the Black Box was a weapon of their making, and here we see proof that this is in fact true. Prospect 2 has resolved to open the black box, and the way that is worded implies that he has had this box all along, which leads me to speculate that it came with the documents of Folder 502 given to him prior to his mission. At this point I think it’s pretty clear that Prospect 2 was sent on his mission explicitly by the Night Owls. I would posit that like the planet in Fossil Genera, the Night Owls took over Prospect 2’s planet after killing their tree of life, and convinced the populace to send Prospect 2 on a mission to save humanity. Prospect 2 believed them, and set out on the task, but in reality all of it was a ruse, or an experiment of the Night Owls. They never really had any wish to see Prospect 2 succeed, they just wanted to toy with him. Which leads me to believe that they were also the ones who hired The Black Mask to dispose of Prospect 2’s confession in Melting City.

Am I me?

What is he? He is found and I will drag him to his end

It’s not selfish if it’s what’s right

He knows I’m looking for him

This thievery is for the bettering of all humankind

So it seems

Here Prospect 2 states he has found a person he has been looking for. We haven’t heard from Prospect 2 since the end of ‘Telos‘, so we don’t really know who he is looking for, but we can see that his intentions for this person are not all that wholesome — I will drag him to his end’. And while Prospect 2 tries to justify his actions, we can see that he isn’t one hundred percent sure about what he is doing, which is clear from the lines, ‘This thievery is for the bettering of all humankind/ So it seems’.

Creep in

Before the rise of the sun

They are sleeping

Holding each other like it’s the last…

And it is

Open the valve

Fill the room

Say goodbye to everything Am I me?

Like in the song ‘Melting City’ we get the lyrics ‘Creep in/ Before the rise of the sun’, which mirrors the change of heart that The Black Mask experienced in ‘Melting City‘, but whereas The Black Mask had a change for the better, here we get to see Prospect 2 change in a pretty nasty way. The lines ‘Open the valve/ Fill the room/ Say Goodbye to everything’ are clearly meant to reference a gas valve. It seems Prospect 2 has snuck into the home of these two individuals, who are holding each, seemingly aware of their fate even while sleeping, and has turned on their gas valve. It’s not clear at the moment if this is what is literally happening, or if it’s simply a metaphor, but what is clear is that this also mirrors what happened in ‘Melting City’. In that song Prospect 2’s wife ended her life by burning down her house — quite possibly by turning on her gas valve and lighting a spark of some sort — while she was still inside. We can do some assumptions about who Prospect 2 has targeted, but let’s save that for when we have a little more information.

Strigiformes:

Seek the day

Never again

Weightless in a sea of space

We get to hear from the Night Owls one last time in this song, and all they are used for here is to let the audience know that everything is about to end. This is the end, ‘Seek the day/ Never again’, after this nothing will be left. The final events have been set into motion, and there’s nothing left that can be done to stop it. Prospect 2 has made his decision, and he has utilized the weapon of The Night Owls, The Black Box, for his own distorted ends — which was just the plan of the Night Owls all along — and humanity is about to see its end.

[Prospect 1:]

Eyes open to the sound of laughter

Like a mighty God casting his spells on the worlds below

The man is me

Here we get to see who the ‘He’ really is that Prospect 2 has been talking about, and of course it’s Prospect 1. Throughout this song Prospect 2 has been asking himself ‘Am I me’ and ‘What is He’, which not only shows how alike this two figures are, but also shows how confused and distorted Prospect 2’s mind is. It’s clear that these two are not the same person, even if they are super connected, and at this point Prospect 2 can’t really differentiate between the two, and in the end it doesn’t really matter, because their fate is the same. It’s a bit unnerving.

While it isn’t explicitly stated, we know that Prospect 1 decided to leave Prospect 2’s company after finding out what ‘The Decision’ was during the events of ‘Telos’. Prospect 1 just wasn’t too privy to the whole “lets destroy humanity” thing, and judging from what Prospect 2 has said above, it seems like Prospect 1 returned to his wife, possibly because he saw the madness that had crept into Prospect 2 after he lost his wife, and realizing the error of his way as well as being afraid of suffering the same fate as his walking mirror, Prospect 1 returned to his life, and is now holding his wife in bed with him. Even though Prospect 1 made the right decision and saw what that he was mistaken to leave his life during the events of ‘Swim to the Moon’, it doesn’t matter; he is still just another pawn in this sick game that The Night Owls are playing out, and he — along with everyone else — is about to reach his end.

The imagery in these lyrics are pretty stunning. Just as the world’s end is being initiated, Prospect 1 wakes from his slumber, and standing before him is the crazed laughter of a familiar man; a man who holds the extreme powers of a God in his hands, and utilizing these powers he is casting devastating attacks upon humanity. Of course we know who this man is, as we have been seeing him take action throughout the majority of this song, but just for emphasis Prospect 1 says ‘The man is me’, which we all know means it is his walking mirror, the deranged Prospect 2.

Can you imagine that? Do you see how brilliant that imagery is? Prospect 1 wakes up and sees the visage of a man using his powers to ravage humanity, destroying it all in one fell swoop, all the while laughing, and Prospect 1 has to deal with the fact that this madman wears his face! It’s utterly insane.

Jet propulsion disengage

Dancing towards our future

A future of nothing

A future towards nothing

Goodbye to everything

These somber lyrics are all that’s left of ‘Silent Flight Parliament’. No happy ending, just the end. Everything has led to this, and it wasn’t too surprising of an ending. We already mentioned that the first song on Future Sequence takes place at the end, and the lyrics in that song told us pretty definitively that this is the way things were going to end. It’s a bit of a shame that these two characters couldn’t resolve their troubles, but s0metimes happy endings are boring. Sometimes the best way to evoke an emotional reaction is by making sure that the end is the end, without any sort of redemption or victory on the part of the heroes. So it goes.

There are two more things I want to make note of in this song before passing on to the final track, and setting this article to bed. The first thing to mention about this song is the title. At the beginning of the song we really have no idea what the title means, but after all that eventually happens, the meaning becomes clear. ‘Silent Flight Parliament’ refers to the night owls; a parliament of owls, passing judgment on humanity, and our two prospects. And eerie name for an eerie song, and a perfect realization for the song’s closing.

The second thing I would like to mention is the fact that the way Prospect 2 goes about destroying Prospect 1’s planet bears a striking resemblance to the death of the planet detailed in the two ‘Lost Perfection‘ songs from 2003’s Silent Circus. As Jimmy mentioned in the first part of this series, we can infer that the man who talks too much in ‘Lost Perfection A) Coulrophobia’ is none other than Prospect 2, and in ‘Lost Perfection B) Anablephobia‘ we get to see what happens right as Prospect 2’s planet is dying. Here, take a look at these lyrics:

Clowns now appear. They are all carrying knives and cups of gasoline.

“Tonight is our death.” The clowns then begin to slash each other…

The skies open up, the flames pour in…

The world watched in awe. MESMERIZED.

The populations soon follow the clown’s lead.

Death is in the air.

The three adults once again start talking…

They ask questions of faith and love.

“We shall live past these days, rid of all we’ve done.”

I see what they mean now… but the wretched smell has overcome…

I am gone…

THE BABY BORN WITH THE END OF THE WORLD… Awake…

The five of us haven’t spoken in hours.

Sitting alone to our own thoughts.

Only we will know what strange things boredom has created

If you’ve been paying attention you can see that the clowns talked about here are possibly the Night Owls who designed the destruction of Prospect 2’s planet, and convinced the populace to follow them to their death. But even more surprising is the imagery in the first stanza ‘Clowns now appear/ They are all carrying knives and cups of gasoline/ “Tonight is our death.” The clowns then begin to slash each other…/ The skies open up, the flames pour in…/ The world watched in awe.” Laughing clowns setting the world on fire with cups of gasoline? Sounds pretty damn similar to a laughing mad man turning on a gas valve and lighting a match, which is what we just talked about with Prospect 2. It’s pretty exciting to see so many visual and lyrical motifs referenced and reinterpreted throughout Between the Buried and Me’s discography. Kudos guys.

Goodbye To Everything Reprise

The final song on Future Sequence is just a short outro, with one last line, a goodbye from our two Prospects, to humanity, and the universe at large. A final goodbye to everyone who has been listening along to the album.

Goodbye to everything.

——————————————————

That’s really all I have for you folks. It’s been quite a journey over the past couple of weeks. I’m sorry it took so long to get these all finalized, but with something as vague as this, sometimes you end up second guessing your own observations. Even now there are a few plot points I’m not too sure about, and maybe in the coming months more clarity will be shed on this story, but I have my doubts. I do want to interview Tommy Rogers or anyone else from Between the Buried and Me, and ask them a few questions regarding the overall concept, maybe hammer out some details, but I don’t think I’ll be revising this concept in the future. It took a lot of work, and while I enjoyed doing it, and listening to such a great album so many times, it just took far too much time for my liking. I tried to handle my usual duties around here as best I could, but I really did become a little obsessed with trying to figure out this thing. Hopefully in the future I can examine some other albums for *prognotes that are not so challenging and extensive, but we’ll just have to see.

I want to thank Jimmy, and every one of my fellow contributors here who helped me piece this thing together, and I want to thank every one of you who took the time to sit through and read these behemoths of articles. It was over ten thousand words, easily making this the longest consecutive article series that the site has ever run, and that’s a lot to digest. So honestly, I thank you all for taking the time to read these. I put a lot of work into these, and I’m glad that so many people were interested enough to give them a read through, and give a comment on what you also thought. These five articles have become some of our most viewed articles for the this year, and that is so awesome. Of course I want to thank Between the Buried and Me and everyone else who worked on the two Parallax releases for making such wonderful, and downright challenging music. It’s been a blast, and I truly love these records. Cheers.

– EC