end of the world cafe (info)   [lyrics]

capo 2nd chord formations:

A good place to start might be with the question 'What is the End of the World Cafe?'  The answer is not easy to explain, but I will do my best to try.  The End of the World Cafe is a knothole in space-time accessible from coordinates close to any major city and during every period in the history (and future) of man.  The staff are incarnated thoughtforms who match the expectations of the patrons.

Let's illustrate this with examples.  If you walk into it in 18th century Ireland, it will look like a pub and have Irish workers.  If you go there in Feudal Japan, it will look like a normal Sakeya.  If you go there in Pittsburgh, it might look like a Steak'n'Shake.  This is shown in this line in the song:

    since its inception, the menu's stayed the same

    the costumes of the patrons are the only things that change

The 'menu's stayed the same' just means that if you expect them to have something, they do, and that doesn't change over time.  The time flow inside the establishment is a quantum anomaly where time passes normally for you, but the world you left is effectively in limbo until your return to it.  In this way, the End of the World Cafe is insulated from being destroyed by Earthly events.

The connection between the End of the World Cafe and time is stated in the line 'where the seconds seem like hours and the minutes take all day,' and it's implied in the use of the word 'day' being the only rhyme for cafe, even though the phrase 'end of the world cafe' is repeated in every verse and in the chorus.

Another question you might ask would be, why pancakes and beer?  It's because I like things that are simple and good, and pancakes and beer are simple and good.

As you may have guessed, not just anyone can walk into the End of the World Cafe.  It's mainly there for time and space travelers, but occasionally a normal person will walk by at the right time for a chance to enter.  I won't get into the complexities of the conditions that enable this to occur, but let's leave it that if you see the sign and it's open, you probably will not get another chance to go there in this lifetime.

    this waitress tells me she wants to serve the world

    but she's no robot, just a skinny teenage girl

This couplet is not only a bad pun, it's also a reference to Jobe the Robot.  He's referenced because he's one of the personages with access to the End of the World Cafe.  The other meaning is inherent in the idea that people in the service industry are like robots.  Maybe that's the real meaning and I made the other one up.

The workers are Watchers, citizens of that planetary neighbor of Jobe's homeplanet.  They don't have to 'descend' to work at this restaurant due to the quantum inconsistencies occuring within the End of the World Cafe.  Their pure-energy state allows them to appear as whatever the patrons are expecting to see. (Watchers are semi-immortal beings of pure energy who can go anywhere in the universe, but if they substantiate into solid matter on a stable planet they will be stuck in whatever form they choose, and they will lose their immortality.)