The Arts in New York City

Author: Will

Music Posting Assignment “Ho Hey” by the Lumineers

Wil Zeng

Prof. Hoffman

6 Dec. 2016

Music Posting Assignment

“Hey Ho” The Lumineers:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zvCBSSwgtg4

The yearning for a love and what it could have been is something, I think, we all feel at some point. “Ho Hey” is about a man who tries to “do right” by a woman but he is lost, he is lonely. He thinks of what could have been, how they could have been together. It’s a song of deep regret, it’s a song of deep remorse, and its perhaps a song of hope.

Expatriates from Boulder, Colorado but originally from New Jersey, lead singer Wesley Schultz, Josh Fraites have a close bond with each other and with the city itself. After his best friend died from a drug overdose at the age of 19, Wesley began signing as a way to cope with his best friend’s brother Josh. They performed various gigs in New York City the early years under various names and formed a close bond signing together as a way to cope with the death of Wesley’s best friend and Josh’s brother. As Wesley explained: “When Wes and I got together, our first band name was Free Beer. It wasn’t serious at first. We were a crappy band doing (terrible) covers. But we slowly started getting away from covers and writing originals. We were doing everything: vanilla singer-songwriter stuff, hard rock, electronic music. There was no focus; it was a mad, random mess.” They later moved out of the city and formed the Lumineers in Boulder and found massive success.

“Ho Hey” looks at the city in a sort of rose-tinted hopeful light. Even though she is taken, even though they never had a relationship, the city is such that anything is possible.

(Ho!) I don’t think you’re right for him.
(Hey!) Look at what it might have been if you
(Ho!) took a bus to China Town.
(Hey!) I’d be standing on Canal
(Ho!) and Bowery.
(Hey!)
(Ho!) And she’d be standing next to me.
(Hey!)

I belong with you, you belong with me, you’re my sweetheart
I belong with you, you belong with me, you’re my sweetheart

The running motif of this song is that reality doesn’t matter if you focus hard enough. It doesn’t matter if you’re some third-rate duo in a city filled with third-rate duos. What matters is this longing, this sense of belonging, this sense of doing things right, this sense of living life without doubt. In the end, the city shows you what you want if you really want it.

This sense anything is possible in this city where anyone can live has really found its way into my heart. More often than not, when I stand on the corner of canal and Bowery, I wonder if my sweetheart might find me as well.