The Story of 'Stay the Night'

Last year was both amazing and awful, fun and scary, beautiful and challenging, and ultimately the biggest test mentally I've had in my life.  I was able to take what audience I got from the show and tour the country as a full-time musician, writing with a bunch of talented people and singing a full show of originals. 

Unfortunately, given how green I was as an artist, the music I was writing just didn't match up to the expectations I'd set for myself regarding the sound I wanted to share. Instead of writing what I wanted to say, in a style that I wanted, I let the million other voices both inside and outside of my head tell me what I should write. The result was music that I was embarrassed to play in front of my band, let alone an audience. 

I released 'Only You' in October - and don't get me wrong, I was proud of it. I was so done singing about that relationship and ready to move on, but I wanted my first song to be the last I ever said on the subject. It got picked up on a few Spotify UK playlists and made some money and I finally felt confident as a songwriter. That being said, I didn't know what I wanted to release next. 

Toward the end of the year, after one particularly demoralizing gig, I was so fed up with playing the music I had in my set. I really wanted to call it quits on everything and go back to the to something more stable. As I was mulling that over, I had one more session set up with Nick Rosen, who I've met singing at Sayers Club in Hollywood. I went in with the initial idea of the song, which at that time was just a few chords and a general melody idea for first verse and chorus. 

Nick was great and we talked about the kind of music I wanted to make, listened to a bunch of stuff and started settling on a sound. We cut the initial demo and when we heard it back we knew we had something special - at least to us. We've worked on a several songs since, and he's one of the first producers and songwriters in LA who hasn't told me who I have to sound like or who I should be as an artist. 

In the process of working on all the new music, I started negotiating with a UK label who had heard 'Only You' and wanted to release a new single. The back and forth went back for months and it eventually fell through (because they are scammers) - postponing the release of new originals. Finally, free from those obligations we got the track ready to release, recording vocals with Tim Atlas and getting it mixed/mastered with Peter Mokran. And that's the track that we came up with.

The song is the first time I didn't write about anyone particular. Yes, there's mention of someone else throughout the lyrics, but its more about the state of mind I was in at the time regarding romantic relationships than anyone in particular. It's about wanting to be close to someone without getting too close. So basically it's about whoring. KIDDING, grandparents. 

I'm very happy with it and the song marks a turn for me sonically. Going forward I'm stepping out of that Adele/Sam Smith space that they own and moving into something that feels more like my own and what's coming out next is very much in this vein.