Holy War

Album: Here (2016)
Play Video

Songfacts®:

  • Alicia Keys sings on this free love anthem about remembering to love, instead of hating our fellow man. She pleads for tolerance and compassion to win out over the destructive forces of ignorance and, violence.

    If war is holy and sex is obscene
    Then we got it twisted in this lucid dream
    Baptized in boundaries, schooled in sin
    Divided by difference, sexuality and skin


    Keys wrote the song with Billy Walsh and Alejandro Sanz. She told English newspaper The Sun: "We had this conversation about what we define truth as and what we say is holy. And the perspective of the song is that we call war 'holy' and yet sex is 'obscene.' It left us confused."
  • Keys shared the song at the MTV Video Music Awards on August 28, 2016 to mark the anniversary of Martin Luther King Jr.'s "I Have a Dream" speech.
  • Keys told Rolling Stone when asked about this song: "We get so afraid to talk to our kids about sex, or we wanna hide all of our body parts and don't let anybody see the beauty of love and lovemaking, yet we let kids play Call of Duty all day and all night, and that's, like, no problem? It's very confusing and twisted.

Comments

Be the first to comment...

Editor's Picks

A Monster Ate My Red Two: Sesame Street's Greatest Song Spoofs

A Monster Ate My Red Two: Sesame Street's Greatest Song SpoofsSong Writing

When singers started spoofing their own songs on Sesame Street, the results were both educational and hilarious - here are the best of them.

Devo

DevoSongwriter Interviews

Devo founders Mark Mothersbaugh and Jerry Casale take us into their world of subversive performance art. They may be right about the De-Evoloution thing.

Bill Medley of The Righteous Brothers

Bill Medley of The Righteous BrothersSongwriter Interviews

Medley looks back on "Unchained Melody" and "You've Lost That Lovin' Feelin'" - his huge hits from the '60s that were later revived in movies.

Jim McCarty of The Yardbirds

Jim McCarty of The YardbirdsSongwriter Interviews

The Yardbirds drummer explains how they created their sound and talks about working with their famous guitarists.

Al Kooper

Al KooperSongwriter Interviews

Kooper produced Lynyrd Skynyrd, played with Dylan and the Stones, and formed BS&T.

Keith Reid of Procol Harum

Keith Reid of Procol HarumSongwriter Interviews

As Procol Harum's lyricist, Keith wrote the words to "A Whiter Shade Of Pale." We delve into that song and find out how you can form a band when you don't sing or play an instrument.