Birdhouse in Your Soul
| "Birdhouse in Your Soul" | ||||||||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
 |
||||||||
| Single by They Might Be Giants | ||||||||
| from the album Flood | ||||||||
| Released | 1989 | |||||||
| Format | 7", cassette, CD single, 12" | |||||||
| Recorded | 1989 | |||||||
| Length | 3:19 | |||||||
| Label |
Elektra (US) Elektra / WEA (EU) |
|||||||
| Writer(s) | John Flansburgh, John Linnell | |||||||
| Producer(s) | Clive Langer & Alan Winstanley | |||||||
| They Might Be Giants singles chronology | ||||||||
|
||||||||
"Birdhouse in Your Soul" is a song by American alternative rock band They Might Be Giants. It was released in 1989 as the first single from the album Flood. It reached #3 on the United States Modern Rock Tracks chart and #6 on the UK Singles Chart and remains their highest-charting single in both countries. In Australia, "Birdhouse In Your Soul" peaked at #125 on the ARIA singles chart. The song returned to the UK Singles Chart in 2010, after its use in a television advert for Clarks Shoes, peaking at #70. The song is sung from the point of view of a nightlight. It is the band's only Elektra release to not be released in the 1990s.
The song tells the story, in oblique terms, of a nightlight with the appearance of a blue canary, from the point of view of the nightlight itself. The summation of its opening statements ("I'm your only friend; I'm not your only friend, but I'm a little glowing friend, but really I'm not actually your friend; but I am") reveals that while it is not really a friend in the traditional sense of the word, its job as a nocturnal protector of its owner (the listener) makes it their only friend while they sleep. It asks the listener to make a birdhouse (being a safe place for something small and vulnerable) for the light it creates in their mind and soul.
The nightlight then goes on to proclaim its identity ("my name is 'blue canary;' one note, spelled 'L-I-T-E'"), and that it will always serve its intended purpose to the listener and their room. It references a picture in the room, probably a lighthouse ("There's a picture opposite me of my primitive ancestry, which stood on rocky shores and kept the beaches shipwreck-free"), and states that while it respects the job a lighthouse does, it would cause shipwrecks if it tried to serve as a lighthouse itself ("Though I respect that a lot, I'd be fired if that were my job, after killing Jason off and countless screaming Argonauts"). It is simply a "guardian angel" for its friend and owner.
...
Wikipedia