Robert Deal’s One Night Stand is a gorgeously organic, entrancing piece of music and writing that feels blissfully nostalgic initially – before evolving to become something crisp, calming, and utterly beautiful in its own refreshing way.
The opening moments of guitar set a fairly vintage scene, peacefully rooted with inspiration from a simpler time. It’s a trustworthy sound, you’re drawn in from the offset by simplicity and the overall mood. As a click of rhythm steps into view, the leading voice emerges and completes the set-up – things remain fairly minimalist, but now you have this incredibly soulful yet hypnotically gentle vocal line, as well as these deeply thoughtful, questioning and passionate lyrics.
The entire song soon starts to feel like a massively intimate, personal outpouring of difficulty and turmoil – almost like a diary reading. The soundscape itself loops out and around you as a soothing constant – that riff, that subtle sense of rhythm, and that voice; all of it just connects in a masterful yet natural way. Fusing poetry with personal reflections on life, the lyrics captivate and offer a fine balance between individual truth and a more widely accessible feeling of isolation or being lost. For this reason it connects in a profound manner. Lines like I’m scared that I am running out of time are easy for the listener to attach to their own world and their own experiences. For these to be delivered in such a compelling, emotionally poignant and genuine way makes the song all the more powerful.
Sometimes a simple set-up is all that’s needed when an idea and a performance are so inherently intertwined and mighty. That’s precisely what you get with One Night Stand. A stunning song that’s easy to have play for you three or four times in a row without getting tiresome – far from it in fact; the more you listen, the deeper you fall into the moment.
Stream the single on Spotify. Find & follow Robert Deal on Twitter & Instagram.
