Straight in — a hard, repeating bass figure with the drum machine right behind it, fast and even. No hunting for the tempo; it shows up squared-off and dark, and the pull on the body is immediate. You can hear it from the first seconds.

And there's the voice, low inside the beat — 'I hear the roar of a big machine' — level, almost severe. He doesn't rise over the top of it, and the band doesn't open up for him; the words just settle into the thing they're describing.

That's the second 'empire down' in a row, and the low end has filled out underneath it — same circling figure, more weight in it. Nothing jerks sideways; the song tightens just by holding still.

Now the commands come quick and clipped — 'get down, get undressed, get pretty' — and the beat takes them without a flicker, which makes them sound organized, almost administrative.

Under all the claims — kingdom, key, empire — the riff hasn't moved an inch. The words stack up like inventory while the bass keeps circling the same few notes.

And the title lands: 'Lucretia, my reflection' — level, unhurried — and then the invitation, 'dance the ghost with me,' with the beat pushing exactly as it was.

At 1:47 the low end leans back in with its full weight, no announcement, and the floor is solid again.

Second pass — same opening line, same riff, nothing added. That's the point: the return feels less like repetition than confirmation.

This verse goes to war — 'love lost, fire at will, dum-dum bullets' — and the music refuses to illustrate any of it. Same tempo, same figure, the drum machine keeping its face straight, and that makes the imagery colder than any sound effect would.

The chorus block comes around again — sons of the city, get down, get undressed — and second time through the phrases sound like doctrine, slogans the song has memorized.

Same run as the first pass — kingdom, key, empire, 'we don't doubt' — riding a groove that hasn't changed since the song began. That refusal to budge is starting to sound like conviction.

A slight lift around 3:02 — the groove holds, but a little load comes off it, and your attention tilts with it.

'We look hard, we look through' — after all that possessing and commanding, the voice turns investigator, checking its own images. The beat doesn't pause for the doubt; it keeps moving right past it.

And then the plainest three words in the song: 'I don't feel.' He keeps repeating them, the voice never loses its calm, and the arrangement doesn't stop to grieve the missing feeling — the drum machine carries straight on past it, which is harsher than a breakdown would be.

Around 3:56 the low drive thickens back up, and the last stretch belongs to the instruments — the voice steps out of the argument and the riff and drum machine run out the distance.

From about 4:20 the pattern starts fraying at its edges. The forward motion's still recognizable, but its hold is coming away in pieces.

You can hear the pattern breaking now — that was one at 4:30 — and a rhythm that never blinked for four and a half minutes is coming apart in stages.

And there's the last of it — around 4:50 the repetitions break off for good. No crash; it just disengages, and what's left is a gap where the riff used to be.