The song is about the fall of communism in Eastern Europe and Russia, resultant about-face consumerism and the passing of the Cold War nuclear threat.
Like the rest of the album Roll the Bones, "Heresy" also marks the transition from the band's 1980s style to their sound of the 1990s where guitars are a prominent part of this song and keyboard and organ are played in the background.
Even on the edge of sleep the drumming moved me, the rhythm stayed in my head, and while working on this song I used variations of it and other West African influences.
For generations, those people had to line up for toilet paper, wear bad suits, drive nasty cars and drink bug spray to get high...and it was all a mistake?
Rush drummer Neil Peart discussed the topic of the end of the Cold War further in his fourth book, Roadshow: Landscape with Drums.