Who has not heard the song performed by American singer and producer Pharrell Williams? Much to my delight it was also played prior to every World Cup match in Brazil!
Happy is part of Williams’ Despicable Me 2 album, which was released on 21 November 2013 together with a long-form music video.
The single’s popularity is really stunning! It reached the highest ranking in the United States, United Kingdom, Australia, Ireland, New Zealand, and 19 other countries. For instance, in UK, “Happy” has sold more than 650,000 copies and was being played more than 5,500 times a week on British radio in peak hours. Furthermore, the single has become a viral YouTube hit. Is that not called a legitimate success?
Who can deny that this number one hit single is also capturing the hearts and ears of us Maltese who hear it as it tries to make us happy?
I wonder if more people will spare just three minutes and 53 seconds, the song’s duration, and peacefully bear a tempo of 160 beats per minute to appreciate Happy? Maybe they would surprisingly find out that their moods are positively changed! A good song is judged by the profundity of its lyrics. So let’s take a deeper look at the lyrics of Happy. The song is a contemporary testament that espouses both the human spirit and will concerning the fundamental human quest for happiness. Even if this spiritual and human pursuit might look or prove fruitless, it is worth embarking on!
“Because I’m happy / Clap along if you feel like a room without a roof / Because I’m happy / Clap along if you feel like happiness is the truth / Because I’m happy / Clap along if you know what happiness is to you / Because I’m happy / Clap along if you feel like that’s what you wanna do.”
From this down-to-earth refrain one can easily deduce that Pharrell’s narrator is determinedly happy, irrespective of the circumstances life might bring along the way. The phrase “room without a roof” is striking for its ambiguity. It’s a half-full and half-empty affair. On the one hand a roofless room can give you the sensation of complete freedom. It splendidly presents your happiness as having no boundaries and limits. Consequently, your happiness can fly to unimaginable heights simply because there is no ceiling that can inhibit it from soaring in the open skies. On the other hand, when you are caught up in a roofless room and it’s raining heavily, where do you go to protect yourself from the heavy downpour? But even that, from Pharrell’s point of view, does not pose a problem at all. He simply suggests “Clap along if you know what happiness is to you”. This catchy line merely shows that in life, unfortunately, there are people who do not know what really makes them happy. Thus, the song’s moral is to remind them that they are responsible for their happiness. They should learn to be happy!
“Here come bad news talking this and that, yeah / Well, give me all you got, and don’t hold back, yeah / Well, I should probably warn you I’ll be just fine, yeah / No offence to you, don’t waste your time / Here’s why.”
While Pharrell recognizes that life is sorely afflicted by any kind of evil, yet he is adamant in persevering in life’s happiness. He is resolute about seeing life’s positive aspects. This life goal is realized when one seriously commits himself/herself to put into practice the fine art of not allowing things to dishearten him/her. Pharrell sings:
“Bring me down / Can’t nothing / Bring me down / My level’s too high…”
As a Christian, I know that serotonin levels (chemicals in the brain that keep a person’s morale high) by themselves cannot help me achieve this noble aim. However, believing and living Jesus’ life surely does make me happy. As Pope Francis says, “Jesus himself is the way, and he proposes this way as the path to true happiness,” namely the living of the Beatitudes he preached and lived.
If you want to be “happy”, why not take a look at Matthew 5:1-12?
Fr Mario Attard