The Alien, a Breakdown – To Break a Needle

I still remember the first time I heard Manchester Orchestra. I was in high school, riding in the car with my mother after she picked me up from the bus stop and the radio was playing “The Gold”. The first notes of that gorgeous guitar riff exploded out of the speakers and collapsed in on itself, descending in a gritty, heart-wrenching cliff dive. Then everything stopped, and in came Andy Hull.

Combining complex narrative storytelling with emotional depth and philosophical sophistication (and of course, amazing guitar playing), Andy Hull quickly became one of my favorite songwriters, and Manchester Orchestra one of my favorite bands. Hull’s writing is never straightforward and is always challenging. One of his greatest skills as a writer, however, is that one’s inability to identify the primary narratives at the center of each song does not diminish the impact that each song has. Furthermore, when one is finally able to understand how the scraps that Hull gives fit into a cohesive whole, that song explodes with meaning, presenting a rewarding experience to anyone that tries to undertake the challenge. One of the best examples in Manchester Orchestra’s discography of this aspect of Hull’s style is the fifth track off their 2017 album A Black Mile to The Surface, “The Alien”.

The track wastes no time getting to the lyrics, with Andy Hull singing after a short intro of some rather eerie clicks. All the verses in the song are structured similarly, using 8 lines each with each odd numbered line being shorter than the longer even numbered line with which each is paired. This is a fairly common structure for verse and a very effective one, maintaining a consistent structure to anchor the ear while providing just enough variation between each subsequent line to retain auditory interest. This auditory interest is further aided through the use of a melodic variation in the third line pair (lines 5 and 6 of each verse) that leads back into the melody established in the first line pair and repeated in the rest of each verse. This structure is shared by all three verses in the song.

Interestingly, Hull employs a very unique rhyme scheme in the verses: he only ever rhymes 2 lines in each verse.

The lights were low enough you guessed

You swapped your conscience with your father’s medication

Limped from Rome to Lawrenceville

And on the way wrote out a self made declaration

While there are examples of internal rhymes, they are too sporadic and inconsistent to confidently and accurately claim they create a rhyme scheme. What is even more interesting is which lines Hull chooses to rhyme in each verse. In verse 1, as shown above, line 2 and line 4 are rhymed. This is the same as verse 3. However, in verse 2, it is lines 1 and 3 that are rhymed. Furthermore, the end rhymes in verses 1 and 3 all rhyme with each other (“medication”, “declaration”, “medication” again, and “revelation”) while the rhymes in verse 2 are unique in this set (“arrived” and “recognised”). The only similarity that the rhymes in these verses all share together is that they are located in the first half of their respective verses and are followed by lines that do not have a rhyme scheme at all. The lack of rhymes in the second half of the verses works so well because the rhymes established earlier in the verse accomplish the pleasantness of rhyme early and, because they are kept apart not being on lines that directly follow each other, allow enough space to let the rest of the verse breathe to the point the audience’s ears are no longer craving and searching for rhymes and being jarred when they are finally deprived of rhymes in the second half of the verses. This is very difficult to pull off without coming off as awkward and messy, and the smoothness of the verses is emblematic of Hull’s mastery of songwriting.

The choruses contrast quite drastically in structure from the verses. These all consist of four lines repeating the same lyrics and even numbered lines slightly varying the melody of the odd numbered lines. Furthermore, each chorus changes what those lyrics are.

Chorus 1:

Do you need me?

Chorus 2:

It’s an alien

Chorus 3:

Didn’t mean to

The repetition of these lines serves to further their importance to the narrative of the song, highlighting the main emotion being expressed through the form of a line of dialogue. While a simple (and therefore easy to screw up) technique, these choruses provided a great contrast to the dense verses while also providing a great hook, especially as chorus 2 uses the title of the song.

The next two sections feature chorus 3 being essentially repeated with a second lyric with a vocal section overlaid and a full outro that changes the harmonic and melodic material and using new lyrics. These sections serve two primary functions. Firstly, especially the repeated chorus 3 with the new vocals overlaid, provide variation at the end of the song, presenting an emotional and musical climax that resolves the tensions of the song. Secondly, especially the outro that presents fully new material, concludes the song and offers a beautiful transition into the next track on the record (a fantastic and underutilized album-crafting technique that more artists should explore to make their records more cohesive).

While structurally straightforward, narratively “The Alien” is rather ambiguous. Hull does not provide us with a lot of details, so it is quite difficult as an audience to parse what narrative he is trying to tell us in this song. Thankfully, Genius.com exists. Thanks to that wonderful website (that admittedly I probably overly rely on), the narrative becomes rather clear. It is pretty much universally agreed by the contributors and commentators for this song that the narrative features the Speaker attempting to commit suidice by crashing his car into traffic. Using this interpretation, the narrative begins to make sense and we can clearly see how each verse correlates to a strong beginning, middle, and end of this tale. As much as I would love to discuss in depth the narrative with this interpretive key, I feel it is more in the spirit of the song to instead merely encourage the reader to explore the lyrics of the song to see how each section ties into the narrative. Trust me, the song becomes even better (and much more heartbreakingly devastating) if you do.

Andy Hull and Manchester Orchestra are one of the best bands for pure songwriting out there. However, my favorite part of this band is that they are still active and still making some of the best music coming out in recent years. This band has been truly inspirational not just in my own songwriting, but in the further development of my taste in music and literature. I am excited to see what else Andy Hull and this amazing band have in store for us.

Have you heard “The Alien” by Manchester Orchestra? Let me know your thoughts on this song in a comment below! And if you would like a Breakdown of any other song, feel free to let me know down below as well. Thank you for reading!