A lovely “Three Sisters” with the much-loved Arwen and Laetitia and a little reflection by me.

A Walk in the Zoo: Establishing a Home Through Music

Three little sisters and a bear get lost in the zoo of Amsterdam. The premise of an almost parablelike tale. Of being lost in a world where nothing is familiar anymore and one loses all one’s bearings and connections with one’s own small existence. This song so beautifully situates the ongoing daily life of the three characters in the bigger scheme of the being of mankind, the fear for a giant world, the dwarfing existential angst. With a jacket for the rain as only protection.

The music of Nits invariably exists in a physical world of earth and sky. A world with its rain and wind, the snow, its night and day and changing of the seasons. Through his lyrics Henk Hofstede made sure a place of shelter was always there coming to the rescue of the lost wanderer. Through their songs, Nits showed themselves to be builders of houses. Trying to make sense of their existence, they often created a topography of places filled with cherished buildings full of loved objects, on the basis of remembered experiences and the feelings that accompany them. Nits wrote numerous songs about houses and homes, buildings or constructions, and the number of tracks where attributes of houses like rooms (Hjuvi – A Rhapsody in Time!), windows, doors, walls, and their internal belongings are at the centre of the lyrical setting, is quite considerable. Their music took on the constructural form of a « portable house ». In their valley of bricks Nits are men with a traditional trade.

On the same album – Alankomaat – Nits went back to the beginning of their genealogy of houses, to the house of Henk Hofstede’s grandfather Jacob. Houses where a home was built in time. Their music feels like the imaginative architecture of a house where you can happily dwell around and linger. The dimension of a cosy inhabitation along with the memories connected to the experiences lived in these houses and places, are what matters most to them. It’s the warm beauty of remembrance and nostalgia that often prevails.

Rain and houses go so well together in Nits’ universe, in their house of sleeping beauties, where the rain falls on the asphalt pavements. Their music is a home of belonging-in-a-world and when you’re adrift or lost in unfamiliar surroundings, the pitter-patter of the rain pouring down on you, there’s always mother’s jacket for the rain. With a capuchin.

Joke Roelandt, March 2023