Songfacts®:

• During an online webchat, guitarist and principal songwriter Paul Waaktaar-Savoy was asked if this song was inspired by David Bowie. He replied: "No, I was trying more for 'I sing the body electric' or something like that. The lyrics are based on almost exclusively technical terms/language. It's a requiem."
• Waaktaar-Savoy explained in publicity materials that the song's novel lyrical style drew on the technical jargon of the Cold War era's Space Race. He said: "The basic was to make a song using only technical terms and phrases, and still make it very emotional and personal. There is such poetry in the old Apollo manuals: 'switch to Omni Bravo' and 'the bright ejector blanket'."
• Waaktaar-Savoy: "It was quite a hard song to record as it changes both time signatures and keys as it goes along. What sounded so simple on the piano got very quickly complicated when it was translated to a full arrangement. I think we got there in the end though!"