Tranquility Base Hotel & Casino: A Unique Heaven or Hell
This is the sixth studio album, Tranquility Base Hotel & Casino by the famous English band, the Arctic Monkeys. It is the turning point of the band's previous guitar-heavy rock to a more pop sound, which also incorporates a bunch of different genres. However, that doesn’t overpower the lyrical genius of this album. There are many different themes of the songs; politics, consumerism, and escapism. But I believe there is a different story underneath. One of an afterlife, whether that be Heaven or Hell, I’m not fully certain. And this afterlife is found in the least likely place, Tranquility Base on the surface of the moon. For those who don’t know, Tranquility Base is where the Apollo 11 mission was, where we first landed on the Moon. It also isn’t an actual base but simply the site of the landing. Tranquility Base So, without further ado let me explain the mysterious afterlife in this Hotel.
Tranquility Base Hotel and Casino:
This is the title song of the album and with that it gives us a brief overview of what the hotel is. The very first line of the song says, “Jesus is in the day spa, filling out the information form”. This line is what first tipped me off to the hidden story. Why would Jesus be on the moon? Unless the hotel is somewhat connected to heaven itself. While we are given very little imagery of the Hotel, however, we can see from the album cover that it is separated into two parts: the hotel and the casino. We also learn later that there might be some sort of neighborhood near the Clavius crater (The largest crater on the moon). This is further explained with the very next line, “...Mama got her hair done…”. We can guess that the mother in question is lead singer, Alex Turner, mother (who isn’t actually dead, I believe he is simply using her as part of the song) Again this raises a question, why is their mother in the same place where Jesus is? Unless, this is some sort of afterlife. The rest of the song continues without raising any more questions, until we reach yet another puzzling notion. “Mama wants some answers… where did it all go wrong?" This verse is at first quite confusing. As we don’t know what exactly the mother wants answers for. However, I think she wants to know how she, or someone else, got to the hotel. Which is said by, “Where did it all go wrong?”. She asked what went wrong that made her end up here. And for a bit of theorizing, this line are be interpreted in two ways: either her asking how she could have ended up in heaven, as in how did she die, or how did she end up in hell.
Four out of Five:
While the title song gave vague insights into the deeper meaning of the hotel, “Four out of Five” gives us the clearest proof of said meaning. And this can be found in the chorus of the song, “Take it easy for a little while. Come stay with us, it’s such an easy flight. Cute new places keep on popping up. Since the exodus, its all getting gentrified…”. This single chorus helps us piece together how the hotel can be an afterlife. First, we have the line “Come stay with us, it’s such an easy flight”. This is the simplest part to understand. When it says take an easy flight, it could mean death. As death is a simple way to get to the hotel, aka the afterlife. Also with them saying ‘come stay with us’, it's almost like the hotel is beckoning people to come to the hotel. Which is similar to someone going towards the light. Next, we have the “Since the exodus…”, the meaning of exodus, for those who don’t know, is the mass departure of people. And I believe this is meaning a mass amount of people dying and arriving at the hotel. Which is helped by the next line “It’s all getting gentrified”, again for those who don’t know gentrification is the changing of the character of an urban area for the sake of more wealthy people. So, the reason the hotel is being changed is due to the great amount of people coming to the hotel and those people being of higher status.
This album is truly something else, and remember this is simply how I interpret a few of these songs. The actual meaning, meaning the ones the artist gave, are interesting in themselves. And if you liked the brief explanation of my view, then you are going to love the rest of it. As the other songs didn’t fit my whole “hidden afterlife” story. So, please I highly recommend that you go give a listen. You will not be disappointed.
