Hey You

I always thought this song was about the isolation some people feel .... Its like they've cut themselves off from the real world and now they're lonely.

I was suddenly put in the psychiatric ward a few years ago after my birthday. I felt like I didn't belong there, and as each minute passed i felt lonelier and lonelier. I didn't speak to anybody there except for asking the nurses for another blanket. The way I spent my time there was sitting in front of my room's window listening to the radio. This song came on, and it was as if the song was speaking for me and narrating my thoughts as I watched people walk past the window, unknowing of my prying eyes. But, by the power of my envy that they were out there it brought people to look at the window I was staring at them through. They could feel me.

"Hey you out there in the cold Getting lonely getting old Can you feel me? Hey you standing in the aisles With itchy feet and fading smiles Can you feel me?"

I learned people's routines from this window and I fell into a pit of despair. But when this song came on I felt enlightened that people out there and around me felt as confined as me. It got me through the time spent there. "Don't give in without a fight"

"sitting naked by the phone" there was a phone at the ward for patients to ask their families or friends to visit or just to talk. Throughout the time spent there, I tried multiple times to call my boyfriend but every time I tried nobody would pick up at his house. I would cry everyday after repeating the same routine, I was figuratively naked in front of the patients and nurses; exposed.

"No matter how he tried He could not break free" I had multiple escape attempts, but due to the security cameras, sedatives and magnetically locked doors I couldn't do it without being stopped, and I wasn't willing to pay a fine for pulling a fire alarm in a hospital. All the furniture was either fixed to the ground or plastic, so any attempts to escape were futile.

I am aware of the concept of The Wall album and I understand what Pink was experiencing, this is just my experience relating to this song.

In context with the rest of the album, in the past songs this person grew up to resent the people around him and close himself from people. This song is the moment in which being isolated for so long, breaks him. The song is a complex narrative that centers around a nameless person who is basically feeling that no one is answering him or her. The repetition of "Hey You' indicates that the person in the song is desperate to have a connection with other people and bring back his sanity. He is clinging, asking for someone to feel him, touch him, to help him, to hear him. It his isolation from the rest of the world that creates an intense desire for a physical, emotional, communicable level. These forms of communication to another person are basic human needs to avoid feeling desolate. The song quotes, "Would you help me carry the stone." This is the burden of the human condition that needs human affection to have a stable sane life.This person for so long built a wall all around him.
This song is the manifestation of this emotion. I could imagine this person going to the grocery store and wanting to talk to some random stranger about his life. Ultimately, his isolation tore his mind into shreds. The music helps blend the feeling. The use of guitar for the high repetitive notes with the blend of the low bass melody creates a gloomy, intense and yet it almost seems like the notes in the song is descending into a greater depression. This descend is caused by the one stand out, loud mid (G) double repetitive note that sounds like daodao. And this shifts from that high guitar makes audience feel that transition from a lighter mood, to a darker mood. The timing of the song and the long strides the singer takes to say each phrase makes each word have a stronger emotional meaning. This is what shapes the structure of the song and the meaning behind it.

The problem is that people try to look for deeper meanings within the album "The Wall" You need to pretty much take these songs without reading too much into them.\ On that note.. "Hey You" starts the second CD of "The Wall", directly after Pink realizes that his wall of isolation he has built around himself is complete. "Hey You" is Pink trying to call out to the outside world but realizing that his communication has been cut. You need to understand the concept of "The Wall" to understand the songs on the album.

it just about someone being trapped. and they r telling him not to let them bury his light and dont let his problems bury him. but in the end it just all crashes down

Like others said, I think it's about isolation, and "losing yourself", either to drugs, mental illness, alcohol or just plain old depression. This song is Pink's desperate cry for help... his mind calls him, but he's lost in the wall he has built around himself. He can't get back on his feet, even though a part of him wants to (the 'singer'). It's a wonderful song. If people could learn to overcome the barriers that divide them, this world would be a much better place.

I agree with Soma. He managed to build the wall around himself so high and shut everyone out that now his cries for help are unheard. He is calling out for help but nobody can hear him. It's almost like screaming but no sound coming out of your mouth. Kinda hard to explain. Almost like he's crying for help, but not in the traditionl way and nobody understands or can see what is really going on...He's despirate now and will call out to anyone...the guy on the street in the cold getting lonely getting old...the guy on his own sitting naked by the phone...the guy out there on the road always doing what he's told... anyone. OR maybe he's crying out to himself. maybe these thing are all him. maybe he's telling himself to not give in without a fight and end up in the ground barried and eaten by worms. hum...

The wall is a story. Songs have meanings. If you can't "slap a meaning" on something, then what can you do with it? People express the meaning through what they write so people that havent been there can have an idea. I think what I'm trying to say is: I completely disagree with Mr. Nice Guy

I think that people are yelling in to Pink, not the other way around. He doesn't hear them, though, because the wall is too high.

I always thought that the first two verses were people outside the wall yelling in at hiim. Maybe one voice is his mother and one is his wife or something, or its just his friends, thats not important, its just people who care for him.. Then the last verse is Pink yelling back. Thats what makes the most sense to me.