Take Me to Church by Hozier is a deep and moving melody
that caresses the spirit and stimulates the mind. Hozier’s soulful voice mixes
with a haunting tune to create this truly mesmerizing song. His message has a
much deeper meaning than what is portrayed by its somewhat cryptic lyrics.
Hozier clearly speaks about the church in a semi-negative light. More
specifically, Hozier poetically describes the relationship, in his opinion, of
the relationship between church, love, and sexuality. His composition has
several layers that relate to religion, discrimination, basic beliefs, and even
the concept of humanity and the suppression of it through religion.
This composition was published in
September of 2013 by Andrew Hozier-Byrne, known publicly as Hozier, is an
Irishman from Dublin. Hozier compares religion to to falling in love, he sees
falling in love as a wonderful death and rebirth. In his music video, Hozier
shows two gay men in love and a group of radical religious members following
one of the men, attacking him, and murdering him. The artist explains that in
Ireland, religion is very important to most and some people cannot see past
their religious beliefs. Hozier also goes a step further by relating his song
to the oppression of the LGBTQ (Lesbian, Gay, Bisexual, Transgender, Queer) community
in Russia through his music video when he shows the masked gang attack one of
the gay men, which happens frequently in Russia. There is much more to this
song than the most major uses of symbolism and the major messages, there are
other little messages that remain mysterious, such as the chest that was
burned, although the contents or meaning of that box remain unknown as Hozier
states that it represents whatever the viewer wants it to. Yes, it is cryptic
which seems to be the artist’s style, but it also leaves room for the audience
to connect to the song personally because that box represents value and the
thing that we find most important, whatever that may be.
There are so many aspects to
consider when determining whether a song or television show is “good” per se.
Some of the criteria I will be looking at its fluidity, or how well the song
flows, its level of depth (the deeper meaning), the message(s), the tone, the
quality of the tune and voice, as well as its relation to popular topics in
modern society.
As far as fluidity goes, Take Me to
Church has a very nice flow to it. Some songs are choppy and lyrics may come
out sounding awkward, but Hozier’s masterpiece is smooth and very easy to
listen to. It is also a very deep song. It doesn’t talk about a breakup, drug
usage, or another empty topic that is popular in today’s musical society. This
song is like a lyrical story that, although it is easy to understand, you must
look deeper to see what Hozier is talking about. This makes Take Me to Church a
very mentally stimulating listen. Take Me to Church has many messages in it.
First and foremost it is describing Hozier’s perception of the relationship
between the church and love or sexuality even. The next message is clearly
about the oppression of the LGBTQ community in Russia, where it is illegal to
be gay, and relates personally to him as he describes (in an interview) people
in Ireland as carrying the weight of religion as it is a very religious place.
The next message that Hozier sends is that falling in love is a religion in the
sense of death, of your previous self, and rebirth, of the new and improved
you. This is why he refers to a woman as a savior in his song. Another message
that Hozier gets across is that love and sexuality, regardless of sexual
orientation, is the most basic human, even animal, thing that we do. He
believes that the church, and organized religion in general, is trying to teach
people to be ashamed of one of the very things that make them human, thus
stripping the population of their humanity in a sense. Hozier has many messages
and they make the listener reflect on his/her own beliefs and evaluate whether
or not they belief something because based on their experience or if they were
taught to belief it. The song carries a haunting tone accompanied by the deep
sultry voice of Hozier. This combination immediately catches the attention of
the listener and makes them feel what Hozier feels. This makes both the quality
of the artist and of the song quite incredible. This song has also been
evaluated on whether or not any of Hozier’s messages can apply to any current
world issues, which in fact it does. The artist shows a gay couple, in the
music video, and a group committing severe hate crimes on this couple due to
that groups homophobia. He explains in many interviews that although he isn’t gay
himself, he believes gay rights are human rights; this relates to a very hot
topic in America right now, which is gay marriage. Overall, if I were to rate
this song based on the criteria I pre-described it would definitely be a 5/5
stars.
I highly recommend listening to this
song as it is both meaningful and aesthetically pleasing. It has a depth to it
that is very difficult to find in today’s popular music. The audience that
would enjoy this song would include people who like blues music, alternative rock,
soulful music, LGBTQ issues, music that induces thought, and anyone who enjoys
haunting melodies with hidden messages!
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