Who Are The Brain Police?
Lyrics
What will you do if we let you go home,
And the plastic's all melted and so is the chrome?
Who are the brain police?
What will you do when the label comes off,
And the plastic's all melted and the chrome is too soft?
Who are the brain police?
What will you do if the people you knew
Were the plastic that melted and the chromium, too?
Who are the brain police?
“Who Are the Brain Police?” asks listeners if the music they listen to would cease to bring them pleasure if the packaging and material fetishes surrounding it were to suddenly disappear. It uses the record album as a model, asking what we’d do if the label were to come off and the plastic were to melt. The middle of this tune about attention to decorum rather than substance is interrupted by a snippet of “Help, I’m a Rock” from later on the album, although the part’s longer here than within its actual piece. This might simply be done to make the song even more eerie, or perhaps to “jolt the listener out of any comfort brought on by identification with this music,” as Kevin Courrier writes. This isn’t the last time Frank will play with the listener’s trained impulse to seize on formulaic music; on the Money album, the sound of a phonograph needle jumping out of a catchy song will frequently keep the ear from getting too used to the pleasant hooks.
