Music Review: Hozier "Take Me To Church"

Hozier

Take Me To Church

Album: Hozier

Year: 2013

        Hozier questions his religion beliefs in the heavy “Take Me to Church.”

         A solemn piano opens the single, setting a disillusioned tone. His girlfriend puts her hand over her heart and does an exaggerated sigh. He laughs quietly and tells her it was a good one. The person sitting behind them turns around and gives them a dirty look. She clears her throat to stop laughing. He wishes he would’ve met her in his early 20s. He might’ve skipped his God-fearing youth group days in college. She speaks up about the hypocrisy in religion. It seems as though the sermons are shaming people rather than inspiring them. The last Mass he attended, the priest criticized women for taking birth control. It was enough to make him quit. What if the woman is raped? What if the woman needs it for medical reasons? There isn’t a gray area. His girlfriend tells him to love unconditionally. With her, he feels alive and free. (“My lover's got humour/She's the giggle at a funeral/Knows everybody's disapproval/I should've worshipped her sooner/If the Heavens ever did speak/She is the last true mouthpiece/Every Sunday's getting more bleak/A fresh poison each week/"We were born sick", you heard them say it/My church offers no absolutes/She tells me "worship in the bedroom"/The only heaven I'll be sent to/Is when I'm alone with you/I was born sick, but I love it/Command me to be well.’)

            In the pre-chorus, he bows his head and echoes the response given in church. (“Amen, Amen, Amen.”)

            In the chorus, he says he’d rather avoid church than hear political propaganda every week. He’d rather not deal with the judgement of a jealous priest for his impure thoughts. He’s find another way to handle his mortality and not give into religion. (“Take me to church/I'll worship like a dog at the shrine of your lies/I'll tell you my sins so you can sharpen your knife/Offer me my deathless death/Good God, let me give you my life/Take me to church/I'll worship like a dog at the shrine of your lies/I'll tell you my sins so you can sharpen your knife/Offer me my deathless death/Good God, let me give you my life.”)

         His mother (who still goes to church every Sunday) tells him he drinks too much. He shrugs it off. A can or two of beer isn’t going to send him into Hell. Religion demands that he give up who he is to believe. However, there are various man-made rules broken by priests and nuns all the time. (“If I'm a pagan of the good times/My lover's the sunlight/To keep the Goddess on my side/She demands a sacrifice/To drain the whole sea/Get something shiny/Something meaty for the main course/That's a fine looking high horse/What you got in the stable?/We've a lot of starving faithful/That looks tasty/That looks plenty/This is hungry work.”)

            The chorus is sung again.

            In the bridge, he says that it’s our trangressions that make people who they are. (“No masters or kings when the ritual begins/There is no sweeter innocence than our gentle sin/In the madness and soil of that sad earthly scene/Only then I am human/Only then I am clean.”)

               The pre-chorus is sung again.

               The chorus is sung again to end the single.

             Hozier’s stern vocals challenge a controversial point of view with intelligence and fire after being betrayed by his beliefs.  Growing up, he was told to follow the Ten Commandments. However, as a child, his parents were admonished by a nun for chewing the body of Christ during Communion. He was told he was the problem after turning to someone within the church for guidance.

           The intellectual “Take Me To Church” is well-written piece that bravely goes against the status quo.