You know the feeling. That driving, upbeat drum intro hits, the "Eh-eh-o, eh-o" chant starts, and suddenly you’re thinking about a Roman volcano, a crumbling building, or a poorly photoshopped image of a dog wearing a hat. It’s weird. Bastille released "Pompeii" back in 2013, but the but if u close your eyes meme didn't really explode until years later, proving that the internet has a very strange, very long memory.
Honestly, Dan Smith probably didn't sit down in a studio in South London thinking his song about the literal destruction of a city would become the soundtrack to people making things vanish on TikTok. But that’s exactly what happened. It’s one of those rare moments where a pop song transcends its original meaning to become a functional tool for internet comedy.
People use it to make countries disappear from maps. They use it to erase the "cringe" parts of history. It’s basically digital white-out.
The unexpected birth of the but if u close your eyes meme
The song itself is actually quite dark. It’s a dialogue between two corpses encased in ash. If you look at the lyrics, they’re asking each other if they’re optimistic about the "rubble" that used to be their lives. Heavy stuff. Yet, in 2020, the internet decided that the bridge of the song—the part where Smith sings but if u close your eyes—was the perfect setup for a visual punchline.
It started primarily on Twitter and Discord before migrating to the heavy hitters like TikTok and YouTube. The format is simple: show an image, wait for the beat to drop, and then show the same image with something missing. Usually, the missing thing is something controversial, annoying, or just plain funny. If you remove Ohio from a map of the United States while this song plays, you’ve got a viral hit. Why Ohio? Nobody knows. That's just the internet.
What makes this work is the contrast. The music is soaring and anthemic. It feels important. When you pair that level of emotional grandiosity with a low-res image of a "Beep Beep Like a Sheep" meme or a political map, the irony hits hard. It’s the sonic equivalent of a shrug.
Why does this specific song work so well?
Timing is everything.
In 2020, when the meme reached its peak saturation, the world was... well, it was a mess. There was a global pandemic. People were stuck inside. There was a genuine collective desire to just "close your eyes" and imagine a version of the world that wasn't currently on fire. The song provided a nostalgic escape while the meme provided a way to laugh at the chaos.
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Also, the "Eh-eh-o" hook is incredibly catchy. It’s what musicologists call an "earworm," but for the meme world, it serves as a "wait for it" signal. You hear those first few notes and you know a change is coming. You’re primed for the reveal.
The lore of Bastille and the ruins of Rome
We should probably talk about the actual history here because the meme actually respects the source material in a roundabout way. Dan Smith was fascinated by the bodies found in Pompeii. He’s gone on record with NME and The Guardian explaining that he wanted to capture the "stasis" of those figures. They were frozen in time.
When you use the but if u close your eyes format to erase something, you are essentially doing the same thing. You are freezing a moment and then altering reality. It’s a bit of a stretch, sure, but the thematic connection is there. The song is about things staying the same ("Does it almost feel like nothing changed at all?") even when everything has been destroyed.
Think about the "Crying Jordan" meme. Or the "Loss" comic. These things have stayed the same for a decade. The Bastille meme is the same. It’s a reliable template. You don't need to be a video editor to make one. You just need a "before" and "after" shot.
The different "flavors" of the meme
The meme isn't a monolith. It evolved.
- The Geographical Erasure: This is the classic. You take a map of the world and remove the UK, or France, or the entire continent of Australia. The joke is usually rooted in some kind of niche internet rivalry or just general absurdity.
- The "Fixed" Reality: This version uses the song to remove something people don't like. Imagine a world without the Star Wars prequels. But if u close your eyes, they never happened.
- The Meta-Meme: This is where it gets weird. People started making "but if u close your eyes" memes about the meme itself. Layers upon layers of irony.
Is the meme dead in 2026?
Short answer: No.
Longer answer: Memes like this don't really die; they just become part of the "standard library" of internet culture. In 2026, we’re seeing a resurgence of mid-2010s nostalgia. Gen Z and Gen Alpha are looking back at the "Quarantine Era" of the internet with a weird sort of fondness. Bastille’s "Pompeii" is a cornerstone of that era.
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It’s also worth noting that the song has nearly 2 billion streams on Spotify. That’s a lot of people listening to a song about volcanic ash. Every time a new person discovers the song, they eventually find the meme. It’s an ecosystem.
One thing that keeps it alive is the sheer versatility. You can apply it to sports (erasing a team's losing streak), tech (erasing a bad software update), or even personal life. It’s a universal language. It says: "What if this thing didn't exist? Wouldn't that be funny/better/weird?"
Analyzing the "Nothing Changed At All" irony
The most interesting part of the lyrics in the context of the meme is the line: "And the walls kept tumbling down in the city that we love / Grey clouds roll over the hills bringing darkness from above."
When someone uses the meme to remove something they love—like a favorite character who died in a TV show—the song takes on a more melancholic, almost sweet tone. It’s not always a joke. Sometimes it’s a way of saying, "I wish it were different."
But let’s be real. Usually, it’s just about making a cat disappear.
The technical side of the trend
If you’re trying to make one of these, you have to nail the sync. The transition must happen exactly when the vocals kick back in after the pause. If you’re off by even half a second, the comedic timing is ruined.
- The Setup: Use a static image for the first 5-7 seconds.
- The Pause: That brief moment of silence in the song is where you prime the viewer.
- The Reveal: The second image (the edited one) appears exactly on the "But."
It’s a masterclass in tension and release. Even if you aren't a musician, you can feel the "drop." That’s why it works so well on platforms with auto-play like Instagram Reels or TikTok. It hooks you immediately.
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Real-world impact on Bastille
How does a band feel when their serious art becomes a joke?
Actually, Bastille has been pretty cool about it. Dan Smith has a sense of humor. He knows that in the modern age, a meme is basically free marketing. "Pompeii" stayed on the charts for an absurdly long time because it kept getting refreshed by these digital trends. Most artists would kill for that kind of longevity.
It also helped bridge the gap between their older fans and a new generation who only knew them as "the guys from the map meme."
Why we still care
We care because the internet is a place of constant loss. Content disappears, websites shut down, and trends move at the speed of light. The but if u close your eyes meme is a way to process that. It mocks the idea of permanence.
It tells us that everything can be erased in a second, just like the people of Pompeii.
But instead of it being a tragedy, we make it a 15-second video with a catchy beat. That’s peak human evolution, honestly. We’ve taken the ultimate destruction and turned it into a "shitpost."
How to use this trend for your own content
If you're a creator or just someone who likes to post, here is how you actually use this without looking like you're five years late to the party.
- Go niche. Don't just remove a country. Remove something specific to your community—like a specific annoying bug in a video game or a controversial rule in a hobby.
- Play with the "Nothing changed at all" line. Use it for a transformation that is so subtle nobody notices. That’s the "elevated" version of the meme.
- Keep the quality high. Don't use a blurry screen recording. Use a clean edit. The contrast between high-quality visuals and the silly concept is what drives engagement in 2026.
- Check the copyright. While the meme is everywhere, platforms have different rules for using the "Pompeii" audio. Always use the "Official Sound" on TikTok or YouTube Shorts to ensure your video doesn't get muted or flagged.
The next time you see a map of the world where Greenland is suddenly gone, you'll know exactly what song is playing in the background. You don't even have to hear it. You just know. Because if you close your eyes, it almost feels like the meme never went away at all.