Song Meaning
John Cale's "Hanky Panky Nohow" feels like a cryptic transmission from a brilliant mind wrestling with societal absurdities. The opening lines, referencing "sashaying gentlemen" and offering "memories of planing lakes" as a balm, suggest a world where superficial grievances are easily soothed by manufactured nostalgia or escapism. This sets the stage for a deeper unease. The narrator's aversion to "religion at my door" and their refusal to answer "panic knocking" hints at a rejection of both imposed belief systems and the chaos of societal breakdown. The question "What law?" underscores a distrust of authority. Cale isn't just being contrarian; he's pinpointing the hypocrisy inherent in systems that claim to offer order.
The pre-chorus, with its pronouncement that "There's a law for everything," takes this critique further. The image of "elephants that sing to keep the cows that agriculture won't allow" is wonderfully bizarre, yet it speaks to the arbitrary and often illogical rules that govern our lives. It's a world where nature itself is subject to the whims of human systems, even if those systems are nonsensical. The "elephants that sing" could represent marginalized voices or creative expression stifled by the demands of conformity ("cows that agriculture won't allow").
The repeated chorus, "Hanky panky nohow," acts as a defiant mantra. It's a refusal to participate in the charade, a rejection of the "hanky panky" – the deceit, the manipulation, the empty promises – that underpin the structures Cale critiques. The phrase itself is ambiguous. Is he saying "no way" to the hanky panky, or is he pointing out that it's all just a meaningless game with no real substance ("nohow")? Either way, the repetition reinforces a sense of resistance, a refusal to be complicit in the absurdity. Ultimately, "Hanky Panky Nohow" is a complex, unsettling, and darkly humorous exploration of power, control, and the individual's struggle to maintain sanity in a world gone mad.
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