8 Songs Booksworms Can Relate to While Singing in Their Dark and Tiny Abode

Songs and literature both teach us a lot about our lives and the world we live in. Though the border between literature and song can sometimes be blurry, the labels we have placed on the two differentiate them in terms of genre. Some novels use songs to communicate meaning while some songs use novels to do the same. David Bowie did it, so did Erykah Badu, Frank Ocean, Kendrick Lamar. They dared sneak literary allusions into their songs. Music and literature are intimately tied to each other, often in ways that are more relevant than one might think. This is true to such an extent that a couple of literary references are hidden in each of these songs. After reading this, music lovers will wish they had met a couple more bookworms!

1. Arctic Monkeys. “Star Treatment.” Tranquility Base Hotel and Casino. 2018.

When the stars shine tonight, you’ll think of the Arctic Monkey’s album. Their first track “Star Treatment,” glows with science fiction content: “hitchhiking with a monogrammed suitcase” winks at Douglas Adam’s Guide to the Galaxy and the entire album is based on David Bowie’s alter ego, Ziggy Stardust. You can’t read the dates 1984 – 2019 without thinking about George Orwell’s sci-fi dystopian novel or Blade Runner, the narrative that takes place in the distant and advanced society of 2019. Yes, Tranquility Base Hotel and Casino is what happens when an Indie band evolves into a futuristic, space-jazz sound.

2. Father John Misty. “Total Entertainment Forever.” Pure Comedy, 2017.

“When the historians find us we’ll be in our homes plugged into our hubs skin and bones.

A frozen smile on every face as the stories replay. This must have been a wonderful place.”

If historians where to find us in some future distant society, we would all be dead and

hooked onto some machine that simulates virtual reality. By saying this, Father John Misty also relates to the premises explored in the novels Infinite Jest by David Forster Wallace and Postman’s Amusing Ourselves to Death.

3. David Bowie. “Tis a Pity she was a Whore.” Black Star, 2016.

Who knew Bowie’s song was inspired from John Ford’s 1633 tragedy “Tis a Pity She’s a

Whore?” Indeed, the play is about a university scholar who has developed incestuous feelings

for his sister Annabella and his attempts to come to terms with this. A while later, she accepts

him and they begin a relationship. She then becomes pregnant and marries someone else.

Tragedy then occurs and a couple violent things as well. But you should really read it if you

want to know the end. It seems Bowie’s song is about a bunch of love affairs and violence and

pity.

4. Frank Ocean. “Othello.” Blonde, 2016.

Frank Ocean references a play from the same era. This time, it’s Shakespeare’s play “Othello”

from 1603. It seems like the seventeenth century playwrights had come back into style in 2016.

5. TV on the Radio. “Love Dogs.” Dear Science, 2008.

TV on the Radio’s song retells poet Rumi’s story in song form: “Lonely little love dog that/ No one knows the name of/ I know why you cry out/ Desperate and devout.” The first four lines describe the prayer’s act of blind faith where a praying man is being questioned by another dude about his faith for God only to realize in the end that his faith will always win. The rest of the track echoes Rumi’s poem with one variation in the end, where water comes and holds the prayer.

6. LCD Soundsystem. “New York I Love You.” Sound of Silver, 2007.

James Murphy references a classic novel written in 1938, by Elizabeth Bowen called Death of the Heart. It is a pre-war novel where tension and apprehension reign and uncertainty rules. In the story, an orphaned girl Portia is sent away to her half-brother’s home when her mother dies and her father runs away with another woman. In this world, she is unable to connect with anyone while she discovers even more betrayal and treason around her. In his song, James Murphy also goes through his own set of existential realizations as he waits in apprehension for the division of his band, thus becoming a Portia figure. So yes, his heart may be dead, but readers who know this will not be able to stop themselves from thinking about Portia and her story.

7. Massive Attack. “Mezzanine.” Mezzanine, 1998.

In Fiddler on the Roof, we see a father trying to maintain his own religious beliefs in a setting

where his daughters may not agree with their father’s faith. The song questions this story:

“once the name goes by… we can unwind all our flaws.” However, you might ask if we can

really abandon our deepest faiths for the benefit of those we love?

8. Erykah Badu. “On and on.” Baduizm, 1997.

Those who are interested in philosophy might recognize the saying: “the man that knows

something knows he knows nothing at all” taken from Socrates’ text Apology of Socrates. If

you can relate to this, you’re not alone as Erykah Badu also references this phrase in the lyrics

of her song. Even though nobody knows anything at all, we just keep going “on and on” in our

mysterious ways.

So I guess that books and songs might actually sometimes be linked to one another.