Results for “fertility and courtship as ritual”

Songs

Greenman

XTC

A hymn-like invitation to submit to an ancient nature spirit, framed as both courtship and worship. XTC build the song out of…

paganism vs. Christianity nature as deity surrender and devotion

Winter Wonderland / Sleigh Ride

Dolly Parton

This is a medley of two Christmas standards, spliced together into one seasonal set piece rather than an original composition.…

courtship and domestic fantasy seasonal ritual nostalgia

So Fresh, So Clean

OutKast

A hook-driven strut through vintage cars, retro cool, and pickup lines, where the chorus's braggadocio functions less as…

vanity and self-presentation seduction and courtship rituals nostalgia for Black pop-culture iconography

After the Dance (Vocal)

Marvin Gaye

A slow-burning seduction built almost entirely on repetition, this track turns a dancefloor encounter into a mantra of desire.…

seduction and pursuit dance as courtship ritual instant attraction

Ms. Fat Booty

Mos Def

A narrative rap unfolding like a short film in three scenes, tracking a pursuit-and-fallout romance with a woman the narrator…

desire versus discernment the performance of masculinity and vulnerability cynicism eroded by intimacy

Fly Me to the Moon

Frank Sinatra

A love song that uses cosmic imagery as an elaborate courtship metaphor, translating grand celestial longing into the plainest…

romantic devotion longing and desire the vastness of space as metaphor for feeling

Heads Will Roll

Yeah Yeah Yeahs

A dancefloor incantation built on a beheading command, this track turns a nightclub into a site of ecstatic dissolution. Karen O…

ecstatic dissolution surveillance/spectacle of the body ritual and repetition

Right In Time

Lucinda Williams

A slow-building meditation on desire built from small domestic gestures rather than declarations. Williams narrates a private…

longing memory and its physical trace solitary desire

Ascension (Don't Ever Wonder)

Maxwell

A love song built almost entirely on reassurance, where the narrator repeats a single vow of devotion until it becomes…

romantic devotion reassurance and doubt idealization of a partner

Night

Bill Callahan

A short, incantatory piece built around a single image—a door that both conceals and contains someone or something unknowable.…

mystery of death or absence the limits of knowledge ritual and repetition

The Eternal

Joy Division

A slow-motion funeral procession becomes the occasion for a meditation on grief, estrangement, and the passage of time as seen…

death and mourning isolation from community childhood and incomprehension

Come All Ye

Fairport Convention

An opening invocation that doubles as a band introduction, this track functions as a ceremonial curtain-raiser for Fairport…

communal ritual music as invocation self-referential performance

Shadowplay

Joy Division

A tense, dreamlike monologue in which the speaker searches an urban and psychic landscape for someone he seems to have already…

guilt and complicity urban alienation performance of identity

Turn On Some Music

Marvin Gaye

A late-career Marvin Gaye track that fuses seduction and sound into one continuous metaphor, using the ritual of playing records…

sex as ritual music as therapy/escape longing and reunion

Watch the Stars

Bert Jansch

A late Bert Jansch piece built almost entirely from repetition and simple natural imagery — stars, wind, moon — cycling through…

natural cycles impermanence meditation/ritual

When the Love Light Starts Shining Through His Eyes

The Supremes

An early Supremes single that plays out a small courtship drama in miniature: a woman rebuffs a suitor's advances, only to be…

courtship and resistance non-verbal communication gendered power in romance

Red Guitar

Cassandra Wilson

This is a meditative, almost devotional song built around a simple ritual: each day's mundane and sensory acts are catalogued by…

impermanence ritual and routine art as anchor

Soon the New Day

Talib Kweli

A club-and-nightlife narrative that follows the mating rituals of a night out, mapping the performance, pretense, and…

casual sex and disposability performance and masquerade gender dynamics and predation

Fun House

The Stooges

Fun House is less a song than a physical event: a repetitive, chant-driven invocation that builds through call-and-response…

bodily release performance as ritual invitation and seduction

Sealion

Feist

A chant-like nursery rhyme built almost entirely around a single nonsense word repeated as a call-and-response hook, tracking a…

ritual and repetition femininity as costume romantic transaction

Thunder and Lightning

Thin Lizzy

This is Thin Lizzy in full riff-driven bravado mode, a Saturday-night anthem that fuses schoolyard aggression, romantic…

masculine bravado violence as ritual working-class nightlife

Wild Child

The Doors

A short, incantatory piece that builds a mythic figure out of contradictions—savior and predator, child and ancient…

messianic imagery primal/animal nature collective identity vs. individual

This Christmas

The Temptations

A warm, low-stakes holiday song built around domestic ritual and romantic anticipation rather than religious or narrative…

holiday intimacy domestic warmth romantic anticipation

In the Court of the Crimson King (Abridged)

King Crimson

This is the title track and closer of King Crimson's 1969 debut, a dense allegorical procession of medieval-fantasy imagery that…

decay of empire and idealism surveillance and control ritual and pageantry

What's on Your Mind?

Eric B.

A New York subway pickup evolves into a slow-building courtship narrative, told from the perspective of a smooth-talking…

courtship and seduction urban geography as narrative backdrop mind versus body

Gold Lion

Yeah Yeah Yeahs

A folk-tinged incantation built around a mythic animal-guide figure, the song trades narrative clarity for mood and repetition,…

loss of control seeking guidance/protection transformation and rebirth

Almeda

Solange

A hypnotic catalog of Black Southern materiality and culture, built almost entirely from repeated color-coded nouns rather than…

Black Southern identity materialism as cultural survival spiritual resilience

My Babe

Spoon

A song about staying put — emotionally and literally — inside a routine that has worn thin, and choosing devotion anyway. The…

endurance of routine devotion as choice stasis versus escape

Little Girl

Muddy Waters

A raw, low-slung blues courtship number in which the narrator badgers a woman with flirtatious questions, building desire…

flirtation and pursuit sensual desire Southern imagery

Earth Intruders

Björk

A relentless, drum-heavy chant that casts a collective 'we' as an invading army of natural forces, half-tribal ritual and…

collective identity vs. individual doubt militarism and ritual violence nature reclaiming or overwhelming order

Home

LCD Soundsystem

Home closes This Is Happening as a slow-building comedown song, one that treats the title word as both destination and evasion.…

escape versus arrival fear of vulnerability nightlife as ritual and anesthetic

Treat Her Like a Lady

The Temptations

A mid-80s Temptations single that reworks old-fashioned courtship etiquette into a slick, upbeat pitch. The narrator presents…

chivalry and gender roles nostalgia for traditional courtship masculine self-presentation

Walkin' After Midnight

Patsy Cline

A woman turns nightly solitary walks into a ritual of longing, hoping that the same restlessness that drives her out into the…

unrequited longing loneliness nocturnal wandering as ritual

Suspirium

Thom Yorke

A hushed, waltz-time overture that sets the tone for a horror film without narrating any plot: it's a meditation on bodies,…

bodily surrender ritual and dance as danger maternal/matriarchal power

Re: Stacks

Bon Iver

A slow, incantatory closing track that reads less like a story than a ritual of release, working through images of debt,…

financial and emotional depletion isolation and self-burial gradual release from grief

When Doves Cry

Patti Smith

This is Patti Smith's cover of Prince's 1984 hit, stripped of its synth-funk architecture and rebuilt as a spoken-sung…

inherited conflict desire and abandonment vulnerability versus pride

Sinnerman

Nina Simone

A traditional African-American spiritual reworked into a nearly ten-minute incantation, tracking a sinner's frantic search for…

judgment and reckoning futility of escape divine justice vs. mercy

Valentine's Day

Steve Earle

A plain-spoken confession of forgetfulness dressed up as a love song, in which the narrator arrives on the holiday with nothing…

romantic devotion failure and forgiveness commercialized ritual vs. genuine feeling

The Next Episode

Dr. Dre

A West Coast victory-lap posse cut in which Dr. Dre and Snoop Dogg reassert their partnership and their region's dominance,…

regional pride hedonism and ritual (weed, cars, drinking) reunion/partnership

Tour de France 2003

Kraftwerk

This is Kraftwerk's minimalist tribute to the world's most famous bicycle race, built almost entirely from a litany of French…

endurance and the body technology and human effort geography as narrative