I got drunk a few weeks ago, and listened to Florence and the Machine’s “Dog Days are Over” repeatedly. Here is the official video: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=iWOyfLBYtuU&ob=av3e
It is weird. Anyway, I can’t easily find a short explanation of what she says it is about, so I am going to take my best guess at it. This sort of thing is useful, because interestingly how people interpret lyrics that are ambiguous seems to be a sort of Rorschach test. If I inadvertently reveal something about me, then so be it. Won’t be the first time.
Here are the lyrics:
Happiness / hit her / like a train on a tra-ck Coming towards her / stuck still / no turning ba-ck She hid around corners / and she hid under beds / She killed it with kisses and from it she fl-ed / With e-very bubble she sank with a drink / And wa-shed it away down the kitchen sink.
The dog days are over The dog days are done The horses are comin’ so you better run
Run fast for your mother; run fast for your father / Run for your children all your sisters and brothers / Leave all your love and your longing behind. You can’t carry it with you / if you want to survive
The dog days are ove-r / The dog days are do~ne / Can you hear the horse-s/ ‘Cos here they come
And I- never wanted / anything from yo-u / Except / e-verything / you had And / what was left after that too / Oh!
Happiness / hit her / like a bullet in the ba-ck Struck from /a great height By someone /who should have known be-tte-r / than tha-t
The dog days are ove-r / The dog days are do~ne / Can you hear the horses / ‘Cos here they co-me
Run fast for your mother / run fast for your father Run for your children all your sisters and brothers Leave all your love and your longing behind You can’t carry it with you / if you want to survive
The dog days are ove-r / The dog days are do~ne / Can you hear the horse-s/ ‘Cos here they co-me/
The dog days are ove-r / The dog days are do~ne / The horse-s are co-min’ So you’d better ru-n /
The dog days and over-r / The dog days are do~ne / The horse-s are co-mi -n’ / So you’d better ru–n
First off, the music itself, outside of the poetry of the lyrics, is energizing. It is anthemic. It is large, not small. Whatever “the dogs days are over” means, the song itself makes me–and seemingly many other people–feel good.
As I interpret this, the whole song can be seen as an internalized conflict between a tacit agreement she had with herself that unhappiness was her lot, and light suddenly shining in.
Do you ever just feel happy, for no good reason? We spend our days, so often, enduring. Then for me at least, on some days, for no apparent cause larger than perhaps pleasant weather, or an unexpected break in work, or for no reason at all, I will feel good, happy, content, at peace. I am not worrying about my next move, or what comes next.
One of our greatest fears, though, is that of expanding, of growing, of breaking out of the protective shell we build and inhabit to protect us from the manifest ravages of the world. If you are open, you will be hurt. If you risk, you will sometimes fail. This is the nature of our existence.
But don’t you sometimes just accept this, and feel joy in the process? I have often likened it to my imagination of surfing (I’ve never surfed), in which there is a fear, but also a rapture that would not have been possible without the everpresent risk of falling. This is what drives risk takers, like skydivers, rock climbers, car racers, and yes artists.
So something like this comes down, and she feels like a deer in the headlights of an oncoming train. She hides, and she hides again. She dissipates.
So there is a disconnect between the feeling and the fear. Even though there are no patent breaks in the narrative, I think we can see two voices, that of the frightened person being attacked by happiness, and that of a larger, perhaps divine voice insisting: your suffering is done, it is over. Can’t you feel the energy, the wind, of the horses, who can gallop at great speeds with absolute freedom?
She runs for her father, and runs for her mother. She leaves all her love and longing behind, because she wants to survive. Why?
The task of all children, which is to say of all human beings, is in some way to expand beyond the context of childhood, to develop a unique self, that in my view is capable of connecting with the transcendant, with God. In a universal sense, we have no parents. Our relation is that of a sovereign soul with the energy that permits our existence.
Now, she is running from happiness. Part of that running consists in a desire to HOLD ON to who she was, which is a daughter, and sister, and someone with an emotional context, a clear place, a self with loves and longings.
She was a selfish person: And I- never wanted / anything from yo-u / Except / e-verything / you had And / what was left after that too / Oh!
But now she can’t even hold on to that. Happiness hit her like a bullet in the brain. Nothing is left, but a swelling cloud of anti-misery. She makes it blue; I would make it yellow.
Oh, who knows if I am right, but I look at this, think of all the people I know, and laugh and cry at the same time.