Listen to Roger Waters’s New Single, “Smell the Roses”

Yesterday, Roger Waters revealed some details on his forthcoming new album, Is This the Life We Really Want?, to Rolling Stone, including the album’s tracklist, contributors and the unfortunate news that its release date would be pushed back a couple weeks, from the previously announced May 19 to June 2.

Today, the legendary Pink Floyd mastermind has released the first single from the LP in the form of the biting “Smell the Roses.” Waters had promised a political album, and this track gives us a good indication of what we’ll get as he takes aim at our current state of perpetual warfare and the follies of those responsible, with lyrics like, “This is the room where they make the explosives / Where they put your name on the bomb / Here’s where they bury the buts and the ifs / And scratch out words like right and wrong,” and the Doors-referencing final chorus where he sings, “Wake up and smell the roses / Throw a photo on the funeral pyre / Now we can forget the threat she poses / Girl you know you couldn’t get much higher.”