Flowers on the Wall

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“Flowers on the Wall”
Single by Statler Brothers
from the album Flowers on the Wall
Released September 1965 (U.S.)
Format 7"
Recorded March 1965
Genre Country
Length 2:19
Label Columbia Records 43315
Writer(s) Lew DeWitt
Statler Brothers singles chronology
"Flowers on the Wall"
(1965)		 "The Right One"
(1966)

"Flowers on the Wall" is a song made famous by country music group The Statler Brothers. Written by the group's original tenor, Lew DeWitt, the song peaked in popularity in January 1966, spending four weeks at No. 2 on the Billboard magazine Hot Country Singles chart.

In the years since its release, "Flowers on the Wall" became one of the trademark songs of the Statler Brothers' 40-year career.

Contents

[edit] Song story

The song is a wryly humorous account of a normal man's isolation resulting from a romantic break-up. Recounting his sad, daily pursuits, "Counting flowers on the wall, that don't bother me at all, playing solitaire till dawn with a deck of fifty-one, smoking cigarettes and watching Captain Kangaroo", are all acts of boredom and lost purpose as well as isolation. The lyrics are also meant to be a thinly veiled cry for help.

The song gained exposure amongst a new generation after it was used by Quentin Tarantino in Pulp Fiction (starring Bruce Willis, who would later quote the song in Die Hard with a Vengeance).

The lyrics of this song were broken down and analyzed in Kurt Vonnegut's Palm Sunday.

[edit] Cover versions

"Flowers on the Wall" has been covered by many singers in many genres. Some of the most notable include:[1]

[edit] References

  1. ^ allmusic

[edit] Sources

  • Whitburn, Joel, "Top Country Songs: 1944-2005," 2006.