I recently heard the song “Land of Confusion” by Genesis for the first time in a long while. The lyrics really struck me more this time than they had previously – maybe it’s because in the last few days I’ve been blogging about how we need to be the ones who help change this world for the better.
Anyway, I decided to look into the lyrics a little bit more, and found the following quotes from Phil Collins and Mike Rutherford:
Phil Collins called it, “A political song about the mess we have landed in.”
Mike Rutherford called this “a kind of ’80s protest song,” adding that, “It’s about how we live in a very nice world, and what a mess we’re making of it. How it should be all so easy and it’s all so difficult”.
Here’s some of the lyrics from this song:
And these are the hands we’re given
Use them and let’s start trying
To make it a place worth living in.
When everything’s gone wrong somehow
The men of steel, the men of power
Are losing control by the hour.
This is the place
So we look for the future
But there’s not much love to go round
Tell me why, this is a land of confusion.
Now can you see why the lyrics of this song seems to strike a chord with me? So just as I’ve said in the last few days that we need to be God to the world, so this song remind me again of the desperate state this world and the people in it are in. The world really does need God, so help tell the world about God, so that we see this world change from a land of confusion to one full of love and compassion for one another.
Here’s the original Genesis video for Land of Confusion – The video uses puppets created by Peter Fluck and Roger Law, who had a satirical TV series called Spitting Image. In the video, puppets of the Genesis musicians are featured, as well as some well-known political figures from that time.
