The Story Behind the Song: Long After Midnight

Photo by Sara Shimmel, edited by Leah Batey

Introducing Long After Midnight, my second single. I originally planned to include it on Naked Bourbon, but I ran out of time and money during production. Eric Metzgar, Scott Kwiatek, and I laid down the rhythm section during our epic 7-tracks-in- 5-hours- session with Jeff Gilhart, our master engineer, back in June 2018. It would have been the 6th song on Naked Bourbon, but it wasn’t meant to be. After celebrating my first release for about a month, I started to get the itch to get back in the studio and finish it. I called up Jeff and scheduled two three-hour sessions during my February break, using my gig money from January to fund it. Six studio hours later, I had a mostly finished product. That kind of productivity is what happens when you already have a great foundation and a tune that’s been marinating for several months.

So I present to you Long After Midnight, your head banging, engine revving, windows down, highway driving, porch sitting, beach cruising, tailgating, backyard barbecuing, last rep pushing, air guitaring, drinking game jamming, smore melting, genny cream pounding summer song of 2019.

To me, Midnight is an embellished retelling of a post-break up phase when I was living at my parents’ house but constantly crashing at my best friend’s place, working at Wegmans and convincing myself to become a teacher. The song chronicles in one night the events of multiple real nights that began with me showing up at his house, alcohol in hand, goading him into helping me numb the pain of love lost.

Lyrics:

I was sitting by the back door waiting for you to get home

I had slight bump little jump lighting up my fourth smoke

I was pullin’ on Four Roses and chasing it with Genny Light

You pulled in and said “oh shit, it’s gonna be one of those nights”