Lazy Flies

Lazy Flies is the third track on Mutations.

Description
Lazy Flies is one of Beck's weirdest and wordiest songs. The song constantly feels like buildup to a chorus that never comes, with the closest thing to that being a few "lalala"s at the end.

As Beck puts it, the song "''Is this imaginary movie about some colonial, futuristic backwater. But it also contains elements of the barrio I grew up in. I grew up in that seedy part of LA where all the Salvadorean mechanics and maids who work in the big mansions of the super-rich elite in the Hollywood Hills live." This mix of imagination and reality, while in most of Beck's work, here is at its most cinematic. It truly is an "imaginary movie.''"

Similarly to other songs on Mutations, images of decay, rot and uselessness are throughout the lyrics, for example, the song title and opening line. Beck, or then narrator, seems to be trapped in a bad place, with hideous games, dust and shadows of sulfur, and throughout it all, he's wondering, who would want to be in this place? Everyone who is there seem to be partaking in useless activities, chewing dried meat, going on brochure vacations and harnessing dead horses.

The theme of decay is found in other songs on Mutations, such as Cold Brains and Dead Melodies. Beck once spoke about this; "When I sing about decrepitude or corrosion, I'm not sittin' at the wailin' wall. These aren't depressing things to me. They're kind of humorous, ambiguous. They're just part of the fabric of my life. In my mind, a perfectly manicured suburban world is more of a wasteland than a pile of rusted iron. I could be writing about the most idyllic place and [I'd] make it sound like a way-station at the Apocalypse."

Lyrics
Lazy flies all hovering above, the magistrate puts on his gloves

And he looks to the clouds all pink and disheveled

There must be some blueprint, some creed of the devil inscribed in our minds

A hideous game vanishes in the air, the vanity of slaves

Who wants to be there to sweep the debris?

To harness dead horses, to ride in the sun

A life of confessions written in the dust

Out in the mangroves, the myna birds cry

In the shadows of sulfur, the trawlers drift by

They're chewing dried meat in a house of disrepute

The dust of opiates and syphilis patients on brochure vacations

Fear has a glare that traps you like searchlights

The puritans stare, their souls are fluorescent

The skin of a robot vibrates with pleasure

Matrons and gigolos carouse in the parlor

Their hand-grenade eyes invalid and blind

A hideous game vanishes in thin air, the vanity of slaves

Who wants to be there to sweep the debris?

To harness dead horses, to ride in the sun

A life of confessions written in the dust

Lalalalalalalalalalala...