This week I am covering a song that has struck me because of my cousin. My cousin is a fantastic singer and he sung this song a few times in the past. Which in turn convinced me to take a good look at it. This song is "The Sound of Silence" by Disturbed.
The song starts off with, “Hello darkness, my old friend, I've come to talk with you again, Because a vision softly creeping, Left its seeds while I was sleeping, And the vision that was planted in my brain, Still remains, Within the sound of silence”. The song starts off with an intense verse that gets your heart and mind racing. I want to say that evil will always get to you and that you aren’t safe, but this ‘darkness’ and ‘sound of silence’ is something completely different. It is almost divine. As I continue this you will see what I mean. I can’t put a definitive description on these two concepts.
The next part goes, “In restless dreams I walked alone, Narrow streets of cobblestone, 'Neath the halo of a street lamp, I turned my collar to the cold and damp, When my eyes were stabbed by the flash of a neon light, That split the night, And touched the sound of silence”. I am deeply moved that this guy had a true revelation while dreaming. Then he woke up and wrote this song. I must add that David Draiman, lead singer for Disturbed, did not write this song. It was originally written by Paul Simon back in 1964. It was first sung by the group, Simon and Garfunkel. This song amazes me even more now that I am taking a closer look at it. This portion is still a part of the dream that the singer is experiencing.
It gets even better, “And in the naked light I saw, Ten thousand people, maybe more, People talking without speaking, People hearing without listening, People writing songs that voices never share, And no one dared, Disturb the sound of silence”. This is an amazing part of the song. There are so many ways to describe this portion. Could it be that this revelation is about how everyone is truly meaningless? That no matter what we say our words fade into the wind and will never be heard again? Is it a prelude to when no one will ever connect with each other as they do now? Is it a prelude to when technology will consume everything about our lives and we, as humans, will no longer do anything with our lives?
The next part of the song goes, “Fools, said I, you do not know, Silence like a cancer grows, Hear my words that I might teach you, Take my arms that I might reach you, But my words, like silent raindrops fell, And echoed in the wells of silence”. This piece could very well be referring to Jesus Christ when He was on the earth and was trying to save the lost. As in, our souls made noise and disturbed the silence, but as we got farther away from him the silence grew faster and faster. I feel that at this point he was probably yelling at the people in his dream to open their eyes and break away from the silence, but it ended without any progress.
The final part of the song goes, “And the people bowed and prayed, To the neon god they made, And the sign flashed out its warning, In the words that it was forming, And the sign said, the words of the prophets are written on the subway walls, And tenement halls, And whispered in the sounds of silence”. Then the song takes a turn that even astounds me. The people in his dream bowed and prayed to a fake god and were given a warning sign. What this sign was I do not know, but it tells them that the words of the prophet are written on the walls and in the sound of silence. It reminds me of when I was told to sit in silence so that I could hear God’s voice. A type of meditation if you will.
This song is beautiful and amazing. You have to listen to Disturbed sing it, because David Draiman really captures the power and feeling of this song in his voice. I don’t think that I have ever had as much trouble describing a song than I have had with this one. I almost wanted to just put the words down on paper and let you decide for yourself. It’s that good. I hope that you guys enjoyed this and I hope that you have a wonderful day.
