Like the Replicas album as a whole, "Down in the Park" marked a major shift from Tubeway Army's previous output. The band's early releases, the 1978 singles "That's Too Bad" and "Bombers" plus the self-titled debut album, contained elements of punk, hard rock, heavy metal and New Wave but were exclusively guitar driven with only occasional use of primitive synthesizer effects. "Down in the Park", on the other hand, was Numan's first composition on keyboards and his first release to feature the predominantly electronic sound that became his trademark. Musically, it pared down still further the guitar power chord and bass root note style arrangements he had used previously, reducing the harmony to bare unisons of layered bass guitar, Fender Rhodes electric piano, and Minimoog synthesizer. The semitone key changes (A to Bb) and chromatic melodic riffs between the song's verses are somewhat unusual in the context of traditional Western music theory but are not unusual in rock music.
Lyrically the song crystallized the dystopian science fiction concept that was the basis of the Replicas album. Heavily influenced by such writers as J.G. Ballard and Philip K. Dick, it tells the chilling story of a futuristic park in which Machmen (androids with human skin) and machines rape and kill human beings for the delight of spectators who, along with their numerically-named robotic "friends" ("Down in the Park, with a friend called Five"), view the carnage from a nearby club ("Zom Zoms").
The piece was typical of Numan's themes at the time, both embracing and fearing technology. In contrast to much contemporary post-punk music, and his own earlier releases, Numan's vocals were deliberately underplayed, leaving the slow and stately synthesizer work to evoke the song's melancholy atmosphere.
In what would become Numan's normal practice, the B-side was a non-album track, in this case "Do You Need the Service?"; the title referenced a line from the works of William S. Burroughs, the service in question meaning pest control. The 12" single included the same tracks as the 7" along with "I Nearly Married A Human (2)", a different mix to the version on Replicas this time featuring drum machine throughout and Numan's recitation of the song's title, the only words heard.
"Down in the Park" has been covered by a number of artists, notably Foo Fighters on The X-Files Songs in the Key of X soundtrack album (1996), Marilyn Manson on the "Lunchbox" and "Sweet Dreams" singles, DJ Hell (a 1998 techno version with lyrics translated in French entitled "Dans Le Parc"), Christian Death (a live performance on The Iron Mask), Girls Under Glass, and Jimi Tenor on the Numan tribute album Random. Terre Thaemlitz recorded two instrumental versions of "Down in the Park" on the tribute album Replicas Rubato, one on piano and the other on synthesizer (the latter a hidden track). Other tribute acts to have recorded the song include Bytet and Reload, on the albums Ghost of a White Face Clown and Tubeway Navy respectively.
"Down in the Park" has been a mainstay of Numan's concerts since his 1979 tour, and appears on almost all of his live albums. An arrangement with solo piano introduction appeared on the Living Ornaments '80 LP, in the movie Urgh! A Music War, and in the Micromusic video concert from Wembley Arena (soundtrack released as Living Ornaments '81). A version for piano alone was the flip side of Numan's single "I Die: You Die" in 1980 (and was also included as a bonus track on the 1998 CD re-issue of Telekon). The original song was remixed twice for the 2003 collection Hybrid, and a demo version of the song was included on the soundtrack of the movie Times Square (1980).
Down in the Park
Gary Numan Lyrics
Jump to: Overall Meaning ↴ Line by Line Meaning ↴
Where the mach-men meet the machines
And play 'kill-by-numbers'
Down in the park with a friend called five
I was in a car crash
Or was it the war
But I've never been quite the same
Little white lies like I was there
Like it was built in one day
You can watch the humans
Trying to run
Oh look there's a rape machine
I'd go outside if he'd look the other way
You wouldn't believe
The things they do
Down in the park
Where the chant is "death, death, death"
Until the sun cries morning
Down in the park with friends of mine
We are not lovers
We are not romantics
We are here to serve you
A different face but the words never change
Gary Numan's song "Down in the Park" paints a cryptic picture of a dystopian future world where technology seems to have taken over entirely. The seemingly innocent title of the song is misleading as the macho men are meeting with machines to play kill-by-numbers, creating an eerie atmosphere where we imagine human life in a completely different context. Numan's vocals are as important as the lyrics, he shares this observation with his listeners, adding emphasis to the dark tone of the song. The singer of the song recalls a traumatic event, but they can't seem to remember if it was a car crash or at war, and it's still affecting them until this point. With little white lies, they try to convince others that they had been there. Then, Numan describes a local eatery called Zom-Zom's, which seems to have been built overnight, and the humans are attempting to flee from something ominous. The rape machine mentioned in the lyrics plays on this unsettling feeling related to the loss of control and the unknown. The singer of the song is afraid to go outside, indicating even more fears about what's awaiting him in the outside world.
The last stanza of the song puts the singer into perspective as someone who is not a lover nor a romantic, but in this world, he is a performer. He is here to serve his audience and offer them a glimpse of this stark, dark world. He is here to prove a point, and the words that he speaks are necessary for us to understand the dystopian world that Gary Numan has created in the song.
Line by Line Meaning
Down in the park
The scene is set in a park
Where the mach-men meet the machines
Men who act like machines gather together
And play 'kill-by-numbers'
They engage in a game where killing is mechanical
Down in the park with a friend called five
The artist is in the park with a friend named Five
I was in a car crash
The artist was in a car accident
Or was it the war
The singer is uncertain if it was a car crash or the war that changed him
But I've never been quite the same
The singer has been permanently altered by traumatizing experiences
Little white lies like I was there
The artist tells small lies to cover up the truth
Come to "Zom-Zom's", a place to eat
There is a restaurant named Zom-Zom's in the park
Like it was built in one day
The restaurant was constructed quickly
You can watch the humans
The mach-men can observe the natural humans in the park
Trying to run
The humans try to flee the mach-men
Oh look there's a rape machine
There is a machine that is designed to rape
I'd go outside if he'd look the other way
The singer wants to avoid the machine
You wouldn't believe
The things they do
Down in the park
The park is a dark and twisted place
Where the chant is "death, death, death"
The mach-men chant about death
Until the sun cries morning
They continue this chant and activity until daybreak
Down in the park with friends of mine
The singer is also with other associates in the park
We are not lovers
There is no physical intimacy between the artist and associates
We are not romantics
They do not believe in romance
We are here to serve you
The artist and associates see themselves as providing a service
A different face but the words never change
The faces of the mach-men may be different but the theme of their actions remains the same
Lyrics © Universal Music Publishing Group, Songtrust Ave, Kobalt Music Publishing Ltd., Warner Chappell Music, Inc.
Written by: Gary Anthony James Webb
Lyrics Licensed & Provided by LyricFind
@zornbratton
Down in the park
Where the machmen
Meet the machines
And play 'Kill by numbers'
Down in the park
With a friend called 'Five'
I was in a car crash
Or was it the war
But I've never been
Quite the same
Little white lies
Like 'I was there'
Come to 'Zom Zoms'
A place to eat
Like it was built
In one day
You can watch the humans
Trying to run
Oh look
There's a rape machine
I'd go outside
If he'd look the other way
You wouldn't believe
The things they do
Down in the park
Where the chant is
'Death, death, death'
Until the sun cries morning
Down in the park
With friends of mine
We are not lovers
We are not romantics
'We are here to serve you'
A different face
But the words never change
@mrm8850
Down in the park
Where the mach-men meet the machines
And play 'kill-by-numbers'
Down in the park with a friend called five
I was in a car crash
Or was it the war
But I've never been quite the same
Little white lies like I was there
Come to "Zom-Zom's", a place to eat
Like it was built in one day
You can watch the humans
Trying to run
Oh look there's a rape machine
I'd go outside if he'd look the other way
You wouldn't believe
The things they do
Down in the park
Where the chant is "death, death, death"
Until the sun cries morning
Down in the park with friends of mine
We are not lovers
We are not romantics
We are here to serve you
A different face but the words never change
@khalidrashid6645
Gary Numan doesn’t get the recognition that he deserves, a true pioneer of early electronic music that paved the way for others after him
@joergdochnahl5130
Ist treu.
@nonewmsgs
Hear hear!
@WestbustahSaucedo
Yep
@DSmith-mg6ui
I remember that Robert Christgau, rock critic for the late great but now defunct Village Voice, once referred to him as "such a small talent".
@alexanderjames6328
@@DSmith-mg6ui That's what we'd expect from a 'clueless' American critic, not much going on from the neck up. Mr Numan is an underrated talent.
@goodlife6145
I had the song playing in my head as I walked through the empty city centre during most of 2020. It felt like a song whose time had come.
@StellaMayfair7
Wow, good call on matching this song to that weirdness! I didn't think of this song at the time but certainly felt that eeriness as I walked through downtown, surrounded by skyscrapers, but with nary a human in sight. "Spooky" doesn't begin to cover it.
@NuisanceMan
@@StellaMayfair7 No humans, but I didn't see any mach-men, either!
@jacquelineiona1996
I match this song to a park in Philadelphia in the late 70s and I was a teen ...some crazy sh*t happened to me and others in that creep park... I think about it when I listen, cannot help it. This song takes me there but I still love the song. There were several 'rape machines' that got away with it too. Tried with me but I escaped several times 🙏 and you wouldn't believe the things they did