The song's highly ironic lyrics comment on British class society while portraying Arthur, the album's ill-fated protagonist, and his empty life in the suburbs.

[3] When the band performed a show in the area during January 1964, the Davies brothers visited their sister in the Adelaide suburb of Elizabeth, where she and her family lived in a semi-detached home in a "designed community.

[5] The lyrics are rife with commentary on British class society and are highly ironic, and in the beginning seemingly condescending, as they mock the illusions of the protagonist Arthur, speaking of his modest home, which he has paid for through a life of toil and hard work, as if it is a some kind of paradise or "kingdom to command," replete with typical modern conveniences such as indoor plumbing and a rocking chair, unlike the kind of working-class house in which he grew up with "lavatories in the back yard," but which has turned out to become strangling and prisonlike with "mortgage hanging over his head," "bills and the water rates and payments on the car," as well as nosy and meddlesome neighbors.

"[8] However, the bridge rocks harder as the lyrics express anger at the superficial suburban lifestyle that Arthur has bought into and his fear of confronting a "false Eden.

"[10] Music critic Johnny Rogan calls the song "one of Davies' best from the period," noting that "his ambivalence to the subject is evident throughout as he takes an alternately affectionate and sardonic look at cosy middle class aspiration.