Meaning of “De Selby (Part 1)” by Hozier
“De Selby (Part 1)” is the opening track on Hozier’s album “Unreal Unearth”, which Columbia Records and Rubyworks made public on 18 August 2023, with the song first being teased, via Instagram, back in January of 2022. To note, it’s followed on the playlist by “De Selby (Part 2)“, which served as one of the singles from the project.
Hozier wrote this song himself (as well as producing it with Bēkon, Gitty and Pete G). And he went on to elaborate that it shares its namesake with the fictional character “de Selby”, as created by Irish writer Flann O’Brien (1911-1966) and featured in his book The Third Policeman (1967).
Admittedly we have not read that novel, but we did do a bit of research on de Selby in our earlier analysis of “De Selby (Part 2)”.
As explained by Hozier, The Third Policeman is sorta like science fiction. And de Selby is a character who is associated with palpable darkness. As implied by Hozier, de Selby also has an affinity for darkness, considering it sort of a liberating phenomenon. But as for the mind, it does not respond well to complete emptiness.
And that is the kind of philosophy we are met with in the first verse. On one hand, we find “the blackness of air” that the singer is referring to as having a calming effect. But he also goes on to note that it is “a darkness so deep that God at the start couldn’t bear”. And what Hozier is alluding to in that regard is the story of creation, i.e. how the Most High opted to create the universe, if you will, out of the darkness that existed beforehand.
So as far as the second and third verses are concerned, it’s as if the vocalist is espousing the darkness over the light, so to speak. In other words, he views the former as being a type of “bliss” and therefore doesn’t understand why God decided to do away with the darkness. In the outro, which is rendered in Irish, it speaks to a concept he picked up from de Selby, that in darkness everything is one and the same.
Or as Hozier put it (as explained in his own words), “if I can’t see where my hand begins and the Darkness ends… they then become literally one and the same”. So the way the singer/songwriting sees it, these lyrics are meant to reflect “de Selby sort of forgiving God for that”, i.e. terminating darkness.
Hozier went on to offer a few more reflections of what this song is meant to represent, including alluding to the outro being romantic in nature. All things considered, if you find this piece somewhat confusing, as his lyrics tend to be, then it would be best to peep out Hozier’s explanation yourself.
But in our own humble conclusion, this is a philosophical song with a religious undertone. And as with de Selby, Hozier is obviously someone who finds value in the concept of complete darkness, apparently viewing such as being akin to an escape from the worries of the world.
