Another favorite of classic rock radio stations along with "Another Brick part 2" and "Comfortably Numb", "Hey You" introduces the second half of the album using all of the pain and disorientation on which the first half was built. Whether it is a satisfactory opening for the second half or not is still very debatable. I'll get into my personal qualms about the song's placement in the album in a paragraph or two.

The story recommences with the well-known, fragile sounding riff played on a reverb-laden twelve-string guitar. It seems only fitting that this second half begins with the haunting echoes of a singular guitar riff mirroring the expansive void of Pink's inner world after the completion of his wall, his lone voice reverberating against his unfilled life unable to fill the vast space. While "In the Flesh?" announced Pink's birth into life (and into the album) with thundering drums and wailing guitars, our hero's (or anti-hero's) delivery into his new disassociated world is heralded with as little commotion as possible. A fretless bass finally joins the delicate guitar before giving way to Pink's solitary voice, at long last alone behind his wall. Paralleling his sudden realization of his expansive surroundings, the music rarely shifts out of its subdued tone, only breaking free once in the middle at the onslaught of another of Gilmour's fiery guitar solos before falling back to the same hollow riff of the twelve-string guitar.

The song's lyrics aren't too hard to explicate once Pink's setting and frame of mind are considered. As Waters states in an interview, Pink is "behind the wall a) symbolically and b) he's locked in a hotel room, with a broken window that looks onto the freeway." Trapped behind a colossal structure made from the pain and repressed emotions of his life, Pink searches in desperation for anything, be it a way out, a fissure through which he might reconnect with the outside world, or simply a willing person on the other side who might listen to his pleas. Accordingly, most of the song's lyrics reflect this search. What makes the lyrics interesting, at least for me, are the nuances laced within Pink's cries. Although he is taking a step forward psychologically by finally turning to the outside world for help (although it might be too late), it's interesting to see how Pink's nihilistic thoughts are projected onto the very world and people whose help he seeks. In the first line he asks for support from "lonely" people who are living in a "cold" world, a state paralleling his own. The next line addresses those who are slowly realizing the reality of life behind their "fading smiles," (coupled with the "aisles," this is a possible reference to his own concert-goers eager for the show), a line that is reminiscent of the harsh understandings of "In The Flesh?" and "The Thin Ice." A few lines down Pink cries out to one "sitting naked by the phone" and one with "your ear against the wall." Once again, both lines are implicative of Pink's personal predicament if we recall his earlier attempts to phone his adulterous wife while curled up on his bed or, even now, his own ears pressed to his wall waiting for someone to call out and rescue him. Even in his attempts to reach out, Pink ultimately reverts back to his former egoism by projecting himself onto the world all around him. Furthermore, his cries for someone to "feel" and "touch" him are interesting in that these are things Pink was never able to do in his life. He built his wall out of the fear of feeling and out of his paranoia of being emotionally touched, of leaving his psyche vulnerable to the whims of the world. Such hypocrisy further delineates Pink as more an anti-Christ rather than a Christ figure. While it was Jesus' golden rule to "do unto others as you would have others do unto you," Pink pleads for others to do unto him what he has hitherto been unwilling to do for others. Yet interestingly enough, he continues to cast himself in this afflicted role, asking those who are listening not to "help them to bury the light," a symbol that takes on Christ-like significance when read in conjunction with certain New Testament writings comparing Jesus to the light of the world. Even if this isn't a religious allusion, it certainly is a literary one. Light is most often used as a symbol of truth throughout most of the world's literature. What's interesting is that Pink never does specify what truth he is referencing in this line. Even if he did, it would more likely than not be ironic in that he is far from seeing the "Truth" of the world after being blinded by his own misery and self-proclaimed martyrdom for so long. A slightly more optimistic view might see Pink as finally realizing the error of his ways in the brief time that his wall has been finished. And so his request for help carrying "the stone" (a symbol of overwhelming burdens since the myth of Sisyphus) could be either heartfelt or narrow-sighted, depending on one's view of the world and our protagonist. As I've said countless times before, it's debatable, especially when considering the song's position on the album. But we'll get to that in a minute.

Just before launching into the guitar solo, Pink asks for the unnamed listener (that is if anyone IS listening…his wife, his mother, or even us?) to "open your heart, I'm coming home." Once again, he is asking those outside the wall to do what he never could. Many people in Pink's life (his wife comes to mind) have tried to find a place in his heart only to be shunned and alienated. Yet at the moment he feels the most danger of being consumed by his own creation, Pink asks to be let into the hearts and lives of his listeners. As before, the line between sincere remorse and insular egoism is blurred, leaving the last lyric just as difficult to pin down as those preceding it. One reading might interpret this last line before the guitar solo in a literal fashion with Pink longing to return to either the watchful care of his mother in his childhood home or to return back to his home to his wife. Another reading might view "home" under a more metaphorical light, thinking that Pink wishes to regress back to his childhood, back to where it all began, so that he might start over and see where things went wrong. Such a reading is based largely on the idea that one can only progress by learning from the past. For Pink to progress, he must first regress and comprehend the people, the events, and most importantly the decisions that have lead to his current entombmen behind his wall.

Almost in response to his desire to return to his origins, the guitar solo ignites, recalling in its very fervor the previous solos reflecting Pink's emotional outbursts created out of his search for self. Like the solo in "Another Brick in the Wall Part 2" or "Mother," the lead guitar in "Hey You" musically conveys Pink's frenzied realizations of his separation from the world. Yet what draws my attention the most is the rhythm guitar in the background which reverts to the same musical theme begun in "In The Flesh?" and repeated throughout many songs on the album. For example, listening to the background guitar in "Hey You" and then the verse vocals in "Another Brick 2" ("we don't need no education") might help one to identify this musical theme upon which much of the album is based. What's interesting about this to me is that it is a musical reversion back to album's beginning with "In The Flesh?" seemingly sparked by Pink's declaration of psychologically returning to the beginning. Just as the guitar solo reflects Pink's ongoing search for self, the rhythm guitar mirrors his attempts to rediscover his origins by literally returning to the musical theme from the very beginning of the album.

At this point the narrative voice (be it Life or the narrator himself) interrupts the story to summarize the story thus far. Pink's resolutions and his belief that he had or would contact someone on the outside were "only fantasy" for "the wall was too high." The wall was fulfilling its responsibility of keeping the outside out and the inside in and, as a result, "the worms ate into his brain." Although the worm symbolism was briefly introduced during the sequence for "Another Brick In The Wall Part 3," "Hey You" marks its lyrical introduction into the album. Roger Waters stated it best in his 1979 interview when he said, "[the worms] were my symbolic representation of decay." Isolation leads to a sort of metaphorical death (Pink's in "Goodbye Cruel World") which in turn leads to decay on nearly all levels be they physical, mental, spiritual, or emotional. Once again mirroring the metaphorical events of the story through music, the introduction of the worms in the lyrics gives way to the incessant humming and buzzing superimposed over the haunting guitar riff, the aural reflections of a horde of metaphorical worms and maggots feeding on Pink's decaying self.

Despite the listener's knowledge of Pink's futile fantasies of reconnection, Pink cries out for a sympathetic ear, openly asking for help rather than masking his needs behind his desires to be "felt" and "touched" as in the first few verses. Nevertheless it seems that he has finally realized what the narrator has already told the listener, that "there's no hope at all." Despite his claim that "together we stand, divided we fall," such a claim is more ironic than anything else considering that this maxim is far from the way Pink has lived his life thus far. If anything, Pink has lived by the belief that together we fall and alone we stand. How else would he be able to justify the completion of his wall? Almost to reiterate such a nihilistic idea, "we fall" is echoed over the last chords of the song as if reverberated through the void from Pink's wall. Not only is such a repetition reflective of Pink's current state but it also foreshadows the eventual fate of the wall itself. When he cries out the last line, it's as if the bricks answer back with "we fall, we fall, we fall" in response to the first half of the line. And so it's as if Pink yells out the solution to his problem, the key to tearing down his wall, in one relatively overlooked line. The bricks fall when "together we stand." Yet being that he doesn't believe the proverb he has just declared, asserting it more in an attempt to convince himself (or Life or God or Fate) that he believes this, Pink's wall will remain standing until he realizes and experiences the importance of the words he has just uttered.

By now you're probably wondering about those aforementioned problems I have with "Hey You." While I think the song is extraordinary and well crafted, I think it's a bit misplaced in its positioning on the album. Waters once recounted how Bob Ezrin called him, remarking how the third side of the album just wasn't right. "I thought about it and in a couple of minutes I realized that 'Hey You' could conceptually go anywhere, and it would make a much better side if we put it at the front of the side, and sandwiched the middle theatrical scene, with the guy in the hotel room, between an attempt to re-establish contact with the outside world, which is what 'Hey You' is" (Waters, 1979 Interview). The idea of "sandwiching" the theatrical scenes is certainly interesting and the music of "Hey You" flows seamlessly with "Is There Anybody Out There?" and the rest of the album. However I'm not convinced that it flows "conceptually," as Waters put it. Going from the Pink in "Goodbye Cruel World" who is resolute in his need for isolation to the Pink in "Hey You" who is suddenly filled with the realization of his errors is a bit too much of a conceptual leap for me. There has been no growth, no personal experience that would warrant such a sudden shift in his personality. Yet the narrative dissonance is further complicated with the succeeding "Is There Anybody Out There?" a tune which presents a Pink far more akin to the "I don't need no arms around me" Pink from "Another Brick 3" and "Goodbye Cruel World." Although he does ask if there's "anybody out there," his asking is very indifferent, especially when compared to the manic need for help as seen in "Hey You." Simply put, Pink goes from vehement indifference ("Another Brick 3" / "Goodbye Cruel World") to unhindered concern ("Hey You") back to tepid indifference ("Is There Anybody Out There" and to some extent, "Nobody Home). "Hey You " works well musically in its current position yet, in my opinion, is too disjointed in terms of the complete narrative. Hence I completely understand why the film sequences for the song were left on the cutting room floor. Despite its absence from the film, though, I am able to offer an analysis of the cinematic sequences thanks to the power of the almighty DVD features!

If the sudden switch in tone between "Goodbye Cruel World" and "Hey You" was not enough to warrant the latter song's excision from the film, watching the corresponding footage should justify why the song was removed from the movie. For the most part, the majority of the video sequences shot for each song advance the story in some degree, whether they further the actual narrative or simply add depth to Pink's splintering psyche. The footage for "Hey You," however, accomplishes little if any of these and at times is so heavy-handed that it seems as if parts of it were lifted from a cliché-ridden art house video.

The song begins with a close up of the bricks in Pink's wall before panning back to show Pink, nearly in the buff, clawing for a way out. The scene then shifts to pan over the blank faces of Pink's concert-goers, each one alike in their vacant expressions. Though we never see Pink on stage, it's as if he's singing his pleas out to the audience, to those "standing in the aisles" as mentioned above. Next is a panoramic shot of a row of empty infirmary beds often seen in World War II movies followed by a long shot of two empty chairs set against a white wall. Pink fades into one chair, motionless, and after a short time, his nude wife fades into the other before turning to look at her motionless husband. For me, this is one of those aforementioned heavy-handed moments in which the "symbolism" is so thick that you could trip over it. The chairs, set at opposite sides of the wall, mirror the distance between Pink and the rest of the world (especially his wife). Furthermore, the wife is depicted nude most likely to show how Pink sees her (and possibly women as a whole) as adulterous harlots concerned only with themselves. She fades out of the chair as Pink sings, "I'm coming home," and the shot quickly shifts to a car exploding as the guitar solo begins. From there, a multitude of rioting scenes takes the screen, alternating between a crowd of mostly skinheads tipping over cars and throwing Molitov cocktails to the police adorned in full riot gear.

As the narrative voice sings about Pink's wall being too high the scene shifts to a hand (presumably Pink's) clawing at the inside of some entombing container followed by a close up of seething maggots corresponding with the metaphorical worms eating into Pink's brain (the same shot from the "Another Brick in the Wall, part 3" montage). A close up of a man in a hospital bed (reminiscent of the WWII movie "Johnny Got His Gun") with a superimposed woman screaming over the image gives way to a close up of a fire started in the previously depicted riots. Following is a long shot of a line of policemen silhouetted by the fire marching in unison in their riot gear. A line of rioters throw flaming debris from the other side while forming a pile with mattresses and desks, a scene reminiscentl of the bonfire in "Another Brick In the Wall part 2." Finally, the shot of policemen marching changes back to the beginning shot of Pink against his wall searching for a chink, a hole, a way out.

Being that the song essentially finishes where it starts with Pink against his wall and that all of the footage in between is either extraneous or used in other songs, it seems that cutting the song from the film was the obvious choice. Relatively nothing is added to the narrative flow or to viewer's perceptions of Pink. "Goodbye Cruel World" showed Pink in this same symbolic posture against his wall as does the beginning of "Is There Anybody Out There?" While the shots of the riot spark thoughts about Pink's own dichotomous sides and his own internal rioting (his rebellious "One of My Turns" side warring against the more rational Pink that finally steps forward in "The Trial"), these scenes are nonessential in that they reiterate ideas that arose in previous songs. Some of these same rioting shots were used in earlier sequences such as in the frenzied collage from "Another Brick In the Wall Part 3." Likewise, the worm symbolism was presented earlier as was Pink's attitude towards his wife's adultery. While the song itself is amazing, the footage is not, especially when viewed alongside the rest of the movie. Thankfully it was cut, creating a more harmonious bridge between Pink's entombment in "Goodbye Cruel World" and the slow realization of the effects of such absolute disconnection in "Is There Anybody Out There?" and the subsequent songs.