Q What makes hosing more fun?
Is it:
(A) Thoughts of death
(B) A good hosepipe or
(c) Jack Daniels
If you answered (A) or (C) then you already understand the words to Bonnie ‘Prince’ Billy’s song ‘Death To Everyone’ where he sings:
“Death to everyone is gonna come /And it makes hosing much more fun”.
This lyric has always mystified me.
What exactly is ‘hosing’ in this context?
Turning, as you do, to Google I found that these words had been submitted to Word magazine as an example of rubbish lyrics.
Coincidentally, the author called himself ‘Steerpike’ – which is my alias on Last.Fm and E-music and would have been on WordPress too if someone hadn’t beaten me to it.
This rival Steerpike assumed that the lines were nonsense and that the Bonnie ‘Prince’ was guilty of making it up as he went along. The replies to his post reveal another story.
‘Hosing’ is, to put it bluntly, another word for ‘fucking’!
Turning to the Urban Dictionary for further illumination, the word is defined as “the act of fornication with no regard for the pleasure of the recipient. Usually accompanied by alcohol and characterized by frenetic intensity”.
Apparently Jack Daniels is often the alcohol frequently chosen for 
to assist this activity. The dictionary defines ‘Jack Daniels hosing’ as fucking which is “often punctuated by slurred expletives, fleeting visions of naked ex-lovers, and a grippng inability to recall the first name of the person with whom you are coupling”.
So it seems Will Oldham aka Bonnie ‘Prince’ Billy knew what he was singing all along and as the corrected Steerpike sagely observed “washing the car will never be the same again”.
If by any chance you don’t know this amazing song, it can be found on BPB’s masterpiece ‘I See A Darkness’ & here it is from YouTube:
I have spent a lot of time asking myself this very question and finally settled with the idea that “hosing” is a job or a task, a daily routine which in itself is not the most hilarious thing you can spend you’re time on earth doing, but having in mind, that you are not going to live forever and that this watering of flowers in your garden is a minor pleasure you are experiencing only a limited number of times in your lifetime, thereby making it “much more fun”. I guess that if you were told that you were going to life forever the idea of hosing and a lot of other small things that you were expected to do could become painfully depressing. I don’t know… But thanx for sharing your interpretation and for doing some research on the matter. Any way we put it, it’s a wonderful song.
All the best, Rasmus.
Nah in this song it means fucking i also read somewhere that hosing here actually means fucking somebody’s else’s girlfriend or wife.
Thanks, Rasmus – I prefer your interpretation to the fornication theory; after all , BPB is singing about being conscious of our own mortality and it is certainly not just another song about fucking. Good call!
Martin