three months to record, developed from 16 songs throughout 1986 and was worked into a now familiar Waters concept album. The Ronald Reagan campaign advertisements during "Me or Him" are sampled from an actual 1980 political advertisement of Reagan's. Concept Billy is a 23-year-old Welshman from the South Wales Valleys. He is mentally and physically disabled as a result of cerebral palsy, uses a wheelchair and is only able to work his upper body. Though he is perceived as mentally challenged, his disability has actually made him not only a genius, but also superhuman, as he also has the ability to literally hear radio waves throughout all frequencies without aid. Billy was living with his twin brother Benny, who was a coal miner, wife Molly, and their children. Unfortunately, Benny has lost his job in the mines due to the "market forces." One night, Benny and Billy are out on a pub crawl when they pass a shop full of TV screens broadcasting Margaret Thatcher's "mocking condescension." Benny vents his anger on this shop and steals a cordless phone. Next, in theatrical fashion, Benny poses on a footbridge in protest to the closures; the same night, a taxi driver is killed by a concrete block dropped from a similar bridge by Benny ("Who Needs Information" – track 2). The police question Benny, who hides the phone in Billy's wheelchair. Benny is taken to prison, and Molly, unable to cope, sends Billy to live with his uncle David in Los Angeles, California, United States. Since Billy can hear radio waves in his head ("Radio Waves" – track 1), he begins to explore the cordless phone, recognising its similarity to a radio. He experiments with the phone and is able to access computers and speech synthesisers, and learns to speak through them. He calls a radio station in L.A. named Radio K.A.O.S. and tells them of his life story about his brother being in jail ("Me or Him" – track 3), about his sister-in-law not being able to cope and sending him to L.A. to live with his uncle Dave ("Sunset Strip" – track 5), and about the closures of the mines ("Powers That Be" – track 4). Billy eventually hacks into a military satellite and fools the world into thinking nuclear ICBMs are about to be detonated at major cities all over the world while deactivating the military's power to retaliate