Stay Awake is another of those special songs laced with sentiment from a particular time. A song about a relationship falling apart felt really personal and important when I was at the brunt end of it.
Love songs are cliché, that's no lie, but humans fall in and out of love all the time, why else are love songs so universal? Stay Awake felt like the fruition of Dean Lewis's retrospection and reflection on a past relationship, and I'm glad I found it when I did. It had that tinge of desperation and hope that clings on at the very end of a relationship and even after, that things could still be okay (even if it isn't). And I'm always a sucker for songs that don't present a happy ending, it always feels more genuine when artists acknowledge and appreciate the sadder things in life.
I do love the guitar riff in this song to death, it's so simple yet catchy and manages to be upbeat while fitting the theme for a song that isn't happy. It happens to be the first thing I tried to learn and play on a guitar, so it definitely has extra sentiment points from me. The instrumentals are amazing, stellar usage of horns in the final chorus to make it just that much more real and final. The pre-chorus and bridge are so well built as well, they dip in the soundscape like smooth valleys and hold the atmosphere to a calmness that makes the intense parts hit harder.
I love the extra touch of energy in the final chorus's "If the feeling's gone", it feels like a final attempt at convincing, and the hint of resignation throughout the song disappears just for the moment, looking for a glimmer of hope that sadly doesn't show. Although this song is about a past relationship, you can tell it's written with recollection and afterthought, like looking at a memory through a window. It's nice to know that, for both Dean Lewis and all those who felt a connection to this song, it represents not just the pain of falling out of that relationship, but also knowing that we've pulled through and made it out.
Heartstrings get tugged hard with this track if you've been in those shoes, it's not the most popular of Dean Lewis's tracks on A Place We Knew but it definitely is my favourite. Being human is one of the best things about music, and he knows how to write it out.
Rating: 5/5