In Hear This, A.V. Club writers sing the praises of songs they know well. This week, we’re picking our favorite songs with whistling.
I’ve never really gotten fully on the Edward Sharpe bandwagon. The whole “semi-commune of free-wheeling people who just love to wear long drapey dresses and weird hairstyles and make music together” thing has never really appealed to me, no matter what the format. That being said, I love “Home.” The 2009 track from Sharpe and his Magnetic Zeros is a little bit ramshackle, what with its vacant whistles and slightly-off duet vocals, but that’s always appealed to me. I love when songs seem genuine and purposeful, and though I might be skeptical about some of Sharpe and the Zeros’ hippie-dippy folksiness five years into their success, “Home” still seems spontaneous and charming, like an ode to life, love, and the pursuit of whatever kind of family you want. And while you could interpret lines like “Home is wherever I’m with you” to be about a couple that’s in love and living on their own little island of sweetness and romance, given the Zeros whole steez, I like to expand it out to the concept of urban families and how, as young people now, we’re able to create the families we want out of the friends we have. It’s a nifty little concept for a sweet little song, I think.