Philomena

Album: What a Terrible World, What a Beautiful World (2015)
Play Video

Songfacts®:

  • This song finds Decemberists vocalist Colin Meloy imploring the titular lady to "let him go down, down, down." Meloy wrote the track before the film of the same name came out. He told The Sun: "It's a fictional name. I'd written it, and then, a short while later, I thought it was ruined forever because of the Judi Dench movie."

    "But I thought I would just go with it anyway. It's sort of about sexual fumbling and bumbling."
  • The song features a retro Phil Spector's sound. Meloy told The Sun: "I wanted to build arrangements for two backing vocalists and it just seemed like the kind of tongue in cheek, over the top song that you could kind of give a Spector approach and still have a song survive."
  • Meloy's chief inspiration was Leonard Cohen, who got Phil Spector to produce his 1977 album Death of a Ladies Man. "I was on a Leonard Cohen kick," he said. "I had the idea of using backing vocalists and having them being an element that ties things together as well as using strings."

    "Then it became more of a big pop sound, which I think sits well with some of our earlier stuff."

Comments

Be the first to comment...

Editor's Picks

Metallica

MetallicaFact or Fiction

Beef with Bon Jovi? An unfortunate Spandex period? See if you can spot the true stories in this Metallica version of Fact or Fiction.

Grunge Bands Quiz

Grunge Bands QuizMusic Quiz

If the name Citizen Dick means anything to you, there's a chance you'll get some of these right.

Tom Bailey of Thompson Twins

Tom Bailey of Thompson TwinsSongwriter Interviews

Tom stopped performing Thompson Twins songs in 1987, in part because of their personal nature: "Hold Me Now" came after an argument with his bandmate/girlfriend Alannah Currie.

John Doe of X

John Doe of XSongwriter Interviews

With his X-wife Exene, John fronts the band X and writes their songs.

Booker T. Jones

Booker T. JonesSongwriter Interviews

The Stax legend on how he cooked up "Green Onions," the first time he and Otis Redding saw hippies, and if he'll ever play a digital organ.

John Waite

John WaiteSongwriter Interviews

"Missing You" was a spontaneous outpouring of emotion triggered by a phone call. John tells that story and explains what MTV meant to his career.