Simply Three Reinvent “Take Me To Church” Into Stunning String Piece
You've NEVER heard Hozier's pop hit delivered quite like this.
Did you really think Hozier's "Take Me to Church" had been dead and buried in the pop pantheon so soon? Think again. Accomplished trio Simply Three—comprised of Glen McDaniel (on violin), Nick Villalobos (on bass) and Zack Clark (on cello)—flip the pop song on its head in a brand new video, released Wednesday (and so far, has collected just north of 12,000 views). The impassioned interpretation strips away the vocal line in favor of a fiddle, bass and cello trading off the melody and supporting the threadline, a gripping reminder of the sturdiness of the material itself. In the live video, the camera pans across the stage, as a ghostly green glow casts its long finger onto the musicians and the dark stage. The audience can only look on in awe; the strings tell a completely new raw tale of love and romance.
"It's a love song. It's very much about sexuality and sex, I suppose, and what it is to love somebody and devote yourself to somebody," mastermind Hozier previously said about the song. "It reflects upon organizations or institutions that would teach people to be ashamed about that."
The sinister edge to Simply Three's emotional and gutting version (filmed earlier this year at the Mesa Arts Center in Mesa, AZ) is akin to the work of mainstream breakthrough artist/singer/ballerina/violinist Lindsey Stirling, who has amassed an impressive and loyal online following of her own, as well. And they say classical music is a lost and/or archaic artform.
With more than 390,000 YouTube subscribers, the trio has previously reimagined songs by Twenty One Pilots ("Heathens"), The Weeknd ("The Hills," "Can't Feel My Face"), Adam Lambert ("Ghost Town"), Taylor Swift ("Wildest Dreams"), Ed Sheeran ("Sing"), Pharrell Williams ("Happy") and Imagine Dragons ("Demons"). Total streams have surpassed the 39 million threshold.
Watch below:
Check out their upcoming tour dates:
October 29 | Chandler Center for the Arts | Chandler, AZ
November 5 | Straz Center | Tampa, FL
November 11 | New Jersey PAC | Newark, NJ
November 13 | University At Buffalo Center for the Arts | Buffalo, NY
November 18 | Weinberg Center for the Arts | Frederick, MD
November 19 | Ferguson Center for the Arts | Newport News, VA
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