Stay by Post Malone
My favorite song to play at the moment
Happy Friday Music Appreciation!
This week is another short(er) post. I’m back on the mainland again attending a screenwriting event for a project I collaborated on.
The song of the week is “Stay” by Post Malone.
It’s an older song that I haven’t really listened to until fairly recently.
My sister was playing it in the car and I asked her if she would ever want to see Posty live. What inspired this question was while listening to the song, I was thinking about what a show of his would actually be like.
My first memory / impression of Post Malone was that he was a break out Soundcloud rapper. I grew up in the early 00’s, where the majority of “popular” hip-hop was very commercial very music-industry products. Of course there’s people that had the true to the culture story of starting on a small level and working there way up - but at the same time, hip-hop wasn’t this niche genre anymore. Rappers were famous and celebrities in their own right. Hip-hop was very much a genre of opulence.
That said, around 2015 or so (the same time the EDM on soundcloud was blowing up), there was this movement of soundcloud rappers. Historically, the most recent (up til that moment) phenomenon was artists blowing up on MySpace and then being able to connect with their fans there. Anyways, Post Malone had that one song White Iverson and it was getting serious radio time, but I just thought of him as that break out soundcloud guy.
Anyways, years later, he’s hit super stardom and since then he’s thoroughly expanded his range. He has some vibey R&B sounding songs, some ballads, and more recently I think he’s dipping his toes into country.
All of this to say - initially, when thinking about what a Post show would be like, my brain was thinking of a hip-hop show. But then I realized, actually he has a quite a range of music.
After exploring that thought a bit more - I decided to try and learn the song on guitar and see how it sounds and feels when playing / singing. Although I’ve started to try and sing more, I’m nowhere near the point of calling myself a singer. However, I did bring this song to a jam sesh with one of my friends that is a singer and I really liked how it sounded and felt.
She usually likes to sing these R&B-ish ballad songs - so although she didn’t bring this song to the jam sesh, I felt it would be a good fit for her and it was!
Always a fun moment when you have a positive suspicion and your expectations are met.
Have a listen and enjoy :)
The Song
Some Thoughts
What I Like Most
This is one of those songs that what works the best (for me) is not the sounds, nor the lyrics, but the feeling beneath it all.
The word “energy” is used a lot nowadays when talking about the abstract qualities of the song. However, when I think of a song’s “energy” I usually think about it in a more objective sense of how much stuff is happening at any given moment in the song. So a high energy song is one where the parts are all firing on their highest cylinders.
This song doesn’t have that sort of energy - it’s really pulled back and ballad-y but the *feeling* of it has a singer-songwriter quality to it. For me it’s reminiscent of the sentiment held by someone like John Mayer - just a dude and his guitar. But it also has the moodiness of early 00’s alternative rock (emo-sad-boy lyrics). And all of that is textured by this slight twang that Post Malone has. On top of that, because he’s a rapper, a lot of his phrasing is more poetic than singy. He just shoves a whole bunch of syllables and lyrics into the bars and at times those words and sentences spill over (enjambment for the poetry heads out there!)
When playing this song, one thing I really enjoy is the chord progression. It’s a little repetitive (as most pop songs are), but for some reason it doesn’t really stale out. It doesn’t feel repetitive when playing and singing. Part of that is the lyrical quality, but another part of it is the melody x guitar overlap that first happens on the phrase of “all that you want and more” as well as the phrase of “too drunk to talk right now.” The phrase is a bit of a turnaround, where it restarts the loop, but because the lyrics are different is both a change up and call back. Additionally, having that moment where everyone sinks up on the phrase does wonders for maintaining the groove and the consistency of the song.
Give the song a deep listen and let me know what you think. For me, it’s one of those songs that was vaguely familiar, but the more I held it and listened to it, the more it really grew on me. And that sort of discovery of the unfamiliar within the familiar is my FAVORITE aspect of “music appreciation.” It is the experience of something *appreciating* in value and likability.
Next Week
Maybe not next Friday, but the week after - I’ll be able to do a quick recording of my friend and I playing this song. Our next jam sesh is scheduled for next week Friday, but as Music Appreciation goes up on Thursday night, I’ll miss the timing of it.
Other than that!
I am still looking for any and all song recommendations y’alls might have, so don’t be shy and PLEASE SHARE :)
Until then,
MYKAAA