“Between the Lines” takes some of the most popular songs in contemporary pop music and dissects their true meaning in an effort to really see the genius behind some of today’s premier lyric writers.  Today “Between the Lines” takes a peek inside the wild minds of Panic at the Disco and their hit single “Nine in the Afternoon” from their latest opus Pretty. Odd.
 
Let’s examine the first verse, shall we…
 
Back to the street where we began
Feeling as good as lovers can, you know?
Yeah we're feeling so good
Picking up things we shouldn't read
It looks like the end of history as we know
It's just the end of the world
 
Lead singer Brendon Urie starts the song out very conversationally.  His brilliance shines in the second line, “Feeling as good as lovers can, you know?”  Yes, Brendon, I do know.  Thanks for asking. Thanks for including me.  Jeez, you’re inclusive.
 
There are many ways to decipher the end of the first verse. Is our happiness nothing but a fallacy?  Are we turning a blind eye to the ills of the world? Are PATD simply trying to rhyme the word “know” with “know”?  Regardless, it’s pretty beautiful.
 
Oh, and global warming, dude. It’s pretty fucked up.
 
The song continues…
 
Into a place, where thoughts can bloom
Into a room where it's nine in the afternoon
And we know that it could be
And we know that it should
And you know that you feel it too
 
“Into a place where it’s nine in the afternoon.”  Get it?  I sure do.  It’s a place.  Where it’s nine in the afternoon.  Shit.  Super deep.
 
It’s all about imagination, homes.  Maybe what exists in our imagination is real and what’s real is really our imagination.
 
Take that in.  It’s heavy.
 
Then we hit the chorus…
 
'Cause it's nine in the afternoon and
Your eyes are the size of the moon
You could 'cause you can so you do
We're feeling so good
Just the way that we do
When it's nine in the Afternoon
 
 Hey George Bush, try all you want, but you can’t take away nine in the afternoon!
 
This song is about the government. I’m totally on board with this. The government is always trying to feed us lies.  There are no aliens, there isn’t a cure for AIDS sitting in a Petri dish somewhere, drugs are bad for you. Come on! Somewhere there’s a room, okay, where it’s nine in the afternoon and aliens are totally running around curing AIDS with a pill that gets you super high.  A pill that makes your eyes the size of the moon, a moon where there’s no American flag, cuz NASA’s never been there. 

Where you could.  So you can.  So you do. It’s all good, baby.
 
The song goes on to repeat these same lyrics over and over again because, well, you need to hear it a bunch to have it really sink in.
 
It’s exactly what the Muppet Babies have been saying for years.