Global Indie Rock Star, Hozier, recently released his new album, Unreal Unearth and is currently on tour for this album. The artist is known for his evocative lyrics, especially in reference to women. Hozier’s artistry showcases this raw vulnerability towards the ills of finding connection and holding on to what you love in a complicated modern world.
Each song he creates is separate from his identity as a man and more focused on the love he has for women, in a poetic way. Unlike many popular modern artists, he describes women without objectification or materialistic views. Since his debut single “Take Me To Church” Hozier has been promoting love that feels special and right to you, despite what others might think. This is what makes Unreal Unearth so relatable to many, and appealing to a female audience, specifically.
Unreal Unearth and Dante’s Inferno
The album’s framework is based on Dante’s Inferno, a poem that guides the reader through the narrator’s journey through the nine circles of hell. Each song is based around some type of longing that the narrator experiences. In a Grammy interview, Hozier explains, “[Dante’s Inferno] is a poem about a person who’s wandering through this sort of underworld space, and in each Circle, they meet with a new person who shares their grievance, their pain, their experience.”
Hozier takes on the role of Dante, as he connects his own life experiences to the treacherous self-reflection one is forced to come to terms with when in hell. He shows what it’s like to miss something you once had: innocence, love, and warmth. All of these things are stripped away when banished to the nine circles.
“Who We Are”
As a preface, I would like to say that Hozier’s lyricism truly shows that love is never simple. People are multifaceted beings, and the characteristics of his work are not components of an upbeat love song. This leads to a more reflective and thoughtful perspective on relationships.
Track 8 of the album, “Who We Are” talks about Dante’s physical journey of continuing through hell, and questioning his own role in relation to the disarray around him. Hozier connects this to finding a new lover and letting them in: “To hold me like water, or Christ, hold me like a knife.” This imagery is quite beautiful and heartbreaking because he means that he’ll let someone cherish him like something essential to his life, or cause unimaginable pain.
In spite of this torture, Hozier describes that it’s just human nature to carry on this journey through life, letting people leave and come in. He also illustrates how trying to find deeper meanings can mislead us from who we are: imperfect, flawed, and bound to experience pain: “How can something be so much heavier, But so much less than what it seems.”
On an ethical level, the choices we make have moral significance, even if an action seems to be small. We can go through our lives thinking that there is only one moral path we are working towards as individuals when it’s much more complicated. There are some things we’ll do wrong, and some things we’ll do right, and that’s just part of human nature.
“Francesca”
The song, “Francesca” is a tale of two lovers, Paolo Malatesta and Francesca da Rimini, who are banished into the circle of lust where sinners who partake in adultery are spun around and winds envelop them. Hozier sings, “My life was a storm since I was born, How could I fear any hurricane?” Paolo believes what he has with Francesca is true love, something right that shouldn’t be deemed as lust or something sinful.
Hozier sings, “I’d tell them, “Put me back in it”(…) I would do it again” meaning that he would go through hell again just to love this person again in his lifetime. He describes a love that is all-consuming: “Heaven is not fit to house a love like you and I.”
Now, this is how you write a true love song! Hozier’s listeners connect with the defense of love that Hozier professes and the lengths he would go to to protect this love. Real love is worth fighting for.
“Unknown /Nth”
The final song from the album which I will be discussing is “Unknown /Nth.” This song describes the last circle of hell, where betrayers freeze in isolation. The song encapsulates this feeling of distance from what once was: “Where you were held frozen like an angel to me.”
When people talk about this song, they talk about a fallen angel, Lucifer, and his relationship with his creator. After all was said and done, he still owes his life and purpose to Him. And God still loves the fallen angel, because God would never truly hate a being that was created in his image.
This song has my favorite bridge of the entire album: “Do you know I could break beneath the weight, Of the goodness, love, I still carry for you? That I’d walk so far just to take, The injury of finally knowin’ you?” Humans silently carry love for other people in their past and long to still know them. However, the song concludes that “(…) there are some people, love, who are better unknown.”
Knowing that you no longer know someone you loved is a part of growing up, living, and being a person. People have to move on and accept the fact that love can pass them by.
Hozier and The Female Lens
Navigating these otherworldly experiences where feeling too much can be seen as negative. Hozier’s position makes women appreciated wholly, which includes the pain that we experience — our complexity, our worth, and our desire for our partners to want to go to lengths to express their feelings.
Again, Hozier is currently touring! Look out for “The Unreal Unearth Tour” and his performances online. I was happy to attend the Santa Barbara show at the Santa Barbara Bowl, where I was so happy to celebrate my love for his music.