The album's title is a reference to an essay by Kurt Vonnegut (collected in Fates Worse Than Death) in which Vonnegut compares commentators on the intellectual and moral decline of society to the Royal Astronomer in The White Deer by James Thurber, who believes that the stars in the night sky are going out one by one, but in fact this is because he is slowly going blind.
Royal Navy | Royal Air Force | Royal Dutch Shell | Royal Society | Royal Albert Hall | Royal Shakespeare Company | Royal Opera House | Royal Victorian Order | Royal Engineers | Royal Australian Navy | Royal National Theatre | Royal Canadian Navy | Royal Canadian Air Force | Royal Court Theatre | Royal Marines | Royal Commission | Royal Academy of Music | Anne, Princess Royal | astronomy | Royal Philharmonic Orchestra | Theatre Royal, Drury Lane | Royal Flying Corps | Royal Canadian Mounted Police | Royal Australian Air Force | Royal Artillery | Royal Festival Hall | Royal College of Art | Royal Botanic Gardens, Kew | British Royal Family | Royal College of Music |