Again let us reflect on the similarities between existentialist philosophy and cheesy Dad Rock.  Human beings are often brought to question who we are and what lies ahead through the unimaginative and repetitive lyrics sung to us by the unnecessarily emotive vocals of the Dad Rock genre, and it is none other than Here I Go Again by Whitesnake that causes us to reflect on the depressing, whiny philosophy of the sad and lonely Jean-Paul Sartre.

The singer starts off by emphasizing Sartre’s greatest contribution to the realm of philosophy: the notion of the duality of freedom. Not knowing where one is going shows us that the future is one endless potential of freedom. We can choose literally any path before us, but also we know where we’ve been, so there is also the binding nature of the past which one must take into account. There is no freedom in the past, and by hanging on to the songs of yesterday, it seems the singer was living in bad faith by embracing just the one aspect of the two sides of freedom. Luckily, he’s now made up his mind, and seems to have broken free of his bad faith and now chooses to embrace the entirety of his freedom.

Next, the singer expresses the morality of the existentialist thinker. As there is no truth, one will never be able to find what they’re looking for; however, in order to be moral, one must keep searching for an answer. To live in this anxiety is to be a moral being, and as Sartre often points out, as does Whitesnake, it is a tough way to live, and the singer asks the Lord for the strength to carry on to live as a moral being, and not to slip into nihilism.

The chorus of the song of course refers to Sartre’s rejection of the Other. The singer realizes that in any kind of social interaction, it is a battle between two individual Selves to turn the other into an object, while maintaining their own free will. Whitesnake recognizes that one can either abandon their Self to become the object their opponent wishes them to be, or to subjugate the other person to become the object of their own perception. The singer, like Sartre, chooses to go on their own, to walk alone, rather than face the hell that is other people.

Whitesnake recognizes the importance of embracing the depressingly lonely philosophy of Sartre, and has made up their mind, and chooses not to waste any time in diving right into a life of cold, hard, bitter misery and despair following the lonely street of dreams. Here they go again. Here they go again.