He told Zane Lowe it was about a past relationship he was in. In the first single off his new album, Sam sings about closing himself off emotionally to protect his heart. The chorus includes one of his most heartbreaking lyrics " But when you call me 'baby'/I know I'm not the only one." Whew.
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Sam realizes his boyfriend has been cheating on him, but doesn't quite know how to stop loving him. While the guy makes him happy, Sam's only hurting himself in the long run by not moving on.īorn out of the anger and frustration that comes along with not being able to tell your crush how you feel, "I've Told You Now" sounds like that drunken phone call you immediately regret the next morning. Perhaps his most cinematic song, Sam cuts himself off from an unrequited love to maintain his sanity. One day the love of your life will make their way to you, but Sam's loneliness seeps through the seams of this song as he patiently waits for the one. Sam Smith's yearning over a Grindr hookup underscores his loneliness and desperation for someone to love. We at PRIDE decided to take this opportunity to rank his saddest songs. The 25-year-old has already had his fair share of heartbreak, made painfully clear with his debut album In The Lonely Hour, and he isn't afraid to transfer his listeners to an incredibly vulnerable and raw place. It is unlikely that Sam Smith intended this though, and no comments have been made about the similarities either.Sam Smith has returned to the pop world after a two-year hiatus, and his music is more emotionally charged than ever.
The song shares similarities with “Drowning Shadow” to the slow 2nd Movement of Rachmaninov’s 2nd Piano Concerto. It is this combination - controlled and unique voice sincere, relatable and skilled song-writing a story that is searingly sad - that has won Sam their fans and success. In interviews they sound upbeat and anything but self-pitying, yet their performances are heart-breaking. Apart from Sam’s pure, haunting voice which expresses the meaning so effectively, many listeners admire their honesty and courage in telling this story of casual sex, drink and unhappiness. This song is powerful and many will relate to it. Its official release came on Novemas Zane Lowe’s World Record on Beats 1. Pancras Old Church in London surfaced online in early 2015. They revisited the song while discussing the album repackage with their label, and “it came alive again” when they sang it with a simple piano accompaniment.Īn unreleased recording of the song from St. “Drowning Shadows” was written before many of the hits from In The Lonely Hour, including “Stay With Me” and “I’m Not The Only One”, but wasn’t included on the album because Smith felt the production never fit the song well. One road would lead to gay clubs that I used to go out to and then the other road would go home and I was in such a lonely, sad place when I was writing this album that sometimes I would literally have to choose, ’Do I go home to nothing? Or stay out for more?’ And that was a genuine choice for me some nights.” The track describes Smith’s feelings of loneliness while living in London – as they described in an interview with Zane Lowe, it was written with a literal crossroads in mind: Called “the saddest song I have ever written,” “Drowning Shadows” is the title track from the Drowning Shadows Edition re-release of Sam Smith’s 2014 debut album, In The Lonely Hour.