You Will Probably Want to Listen to Darkest Hour’s “Timeless Numbers” a Number of Times
“What is this place? Who are these beings?” vocalist John Henry wonders on “Timeless Numbers,” the new song from Darkest Hour. “They look like us… something’s different, deceiving.”
These lyrics evoke The Body Snatchers, Jack Finney’s 1954 novel, which has been turned into a movie something like 27,000 times. The gist of the story, for the three of you who have never encountered it in any form, is that alien “pod people” begin to replace real people. So, for example, you wake up one morning, and your spouse is acting kinda weird, and that’s because it’s not really your spouse, it’s an alien lookalike who has killed and replaced your spouse, and your own doppelgänger will be along shortly.
The reason The Body Snatchers has endured for 60+ years is because the concept is really simple and really scary; it implies physical danger, but also a philosophical mindfuck. As a consequence, The Body Snatchers and all of its various adaptations have been interpreted as political allegories.
So, funny enough, guitarist Mike Schleibaum tells Loudwire that “Timeless Numbers” is both “the continuation of the storyline that permeates the album” and — you guessed it — a political allegory:
“[The song] is a reflection on the drain of modern life and the subsequent division / internal destruction that this life seems to always lead humanity towards. As we travel the world, we have seen how no matter where you are, humans divide themselves. We interact with immigration policies, boarders and barriers that are cultural, economic and political everyday that we are on tour. While traveling the world we have done our best to spread a message of anti-nationalism, unilateral respect for humans of all forms, and lastly the basic idea that music/art is more powerful and more eternal then religion, nation states or even TECHNOLOGY!”
Mighty interesting, no?
But even if you wanna ignore all that stuff, like The Body Snatchers, “Timeless Numbers” can be consumed and enjoyed purely on the level of expertly-executed entertainment. Or, put another way: the song fucking rocks.
Check out “Timeless Numbers” below. It will appear on Darkest Hour’s new album, Godless Prophets & The Migrant Flora, which comes out March 10 on Southern Lord. You can pre-order physical copies here and digital editions here or here.
Meanwhile, the band kicks off a MetalSucks-sponsored tour in February! Support will come from Ringworm, Rotten Sound, Tombs, and Rivers of Nihil. Get dates here!!!
