Exploring Birdsong have shared an official video for their new single “42.” Vocalist Lynsey Ward said the following:
“’42’ is a song about paranoia, conspiracy theories and confirmation bias — it is written from the perspective of someone who has lost touch with reality, seeing patterns in their day to day life that are leading them to some answer, or a warning — but never quite getting the full picture of what it could all mean. Thematically, the song was drawn from personal experience in childhood, where a few coincidences with numbers could spiral into a feeling of being ‘followed’ by a number or symbol, and like the storyline of the rest of your life was being written with this at the centre, or as a clue.
Conspiracy theories are more rife than ever, especially after spreading like wildfire during the pandemic. We wanted to present this as a sympathetic look at how something so simple can go so wrong, and where that desperation can lead; a state of anxiety, isolation, and losing touch with the world around you. The great irony is that, to some degree, we have now become the people in the story. We each notice the number ’42’ so regularly now that we update one another every time it pops up somewhere unexpected.”