The song comes across as a musical nightmare - fitting for the title ‘Swiss Nightmare’. The music and lyrics work closely together to paint a gloomy vision of the future:
The lyrics provide the concrete threat (climate catastrophe, loss of culture),
The music reinforces the feeling of restlessness, desolation and stagnation.
The song imagines Switzerland in the year 2100, where there is no more snow and the Alps are covered in sand. The first classical part of the track foreshadows the year 2024, while the psychedelic second part reflects the future of 2100.
Environmental theme:
The text alludes to climate change - the classic Swiss snowy landscape is replaced by ‘sand’, which indicates an extreme change (e.g. desertification, heat waves).
Symbolism:
Cows, a typical symbol of Switzerland, can no longer find any ‘green’ - i.e. no grass, no pastures. This indicates ecological destruction or an agricultural crisis.
Threat from snakes:
Snakes often symbolise danger, threat or something unnatural - they don't fit in with the classic Alpine idyll.
Last lines:
‘No more words and no more song’ sounds like a resigned swan song - enough has been said, the world knows the problems (‘you all know what's going wrong’), but nothing is happening.