Q: I can’t emphasize how special the song is. I’ll never forget first hearing it, I was hypnotized from the first note to the last, and I don’t think I’ll ever forget to stop listening to it. This is your first-ever release. Please correct me if I’m wrong. What place (mentally and emotionally) were you in to produce such a heavily emotional song?
PAUL PHILIP MORONEY: Firstly, thank you, Taylor. I am struggling to express what those kind sentiments mean to me. As you said, this is my first-ever release, I wrote it at a time when I had my heart broken and was in a vulnerable place, and I wrote some of the lines as I have always found playing role reversal or switching the perspective helped e.g. what would she have been a thinking at the time, and what if it wasn’t the end but the start of something beautiful etc. Anyway, at the same time, I remember celebrating my Nan and Grandads 50th wedding anniversary, I think it was.
And this sounds odd, but I was weirdly jealous of the commitment and the love, and I looked back at my lyrics for this song, and I just thought about my Nan and Grandad again and just thought, I’m jealous of the beauty of it, and at the same time, really sad that at some point these two constants in each other’s lives will reach a point where one will have to say goodbye to the other, yeah that choked me up and I spent the next day writing the song and knew it was something people could relate to at various times of their life and in a variety of circumstances, that would evoke an interesting mix of memories and emotions.
Q: I think you successfully captured the essence of Love—it’s happy, heartbreaking, lost, etc. And I love how haunting “(Remember) I Loved You” sounds. It may just be me, but the effect on the voice during the “Sometimes I still call your name like you’re in another room” part and the rest of it sounds like multiple voices. And it makes me wonder why the song was produced the way it was because the instrumentation really elevated the emotionality of the song.
PAUL: I like how you went with haunting. It’s interesting because in my head at the time of writing, I do remember that half the battle in living on is carrying the person with you and fighting that feeling of it hurts to remember, but how lucky was I to have had this, and it’s opposite of forcing yourself to try and forget because of how painful it is and the injustice of losing this special person. Again, your point about the line “Sometimes I still call your name like you’re in another room” is that thing of almost muscle memory.
This person has been a constant, and after some time, old habits kick in, and you call the person’s name, maybe something interesting came on the news etc, and sometimes you realize, wait, they are gone, but sometimes, you have that mindset of, did the person not hear me, what are they up to now, so you go looking for them? And then it hits you twice as hard as you walk into another room and you realize exactly why you are there, you are essentially following a beloved ghost, if that makes sense.
In terms of production, when the theme is being remembered, and last moments etc, I wanted a feeling of heartbeats, and the multiple voices were like my attempt at time displacement, I guess, where I imagine when you hear someone say their final words, and you both know that is the case, I’m not sure if you hear it in real-time, if it’s delayed if it’s echoed, because of the realization of the last moments, so that was the idea behind that.
Q: How do you want your listeners to feel when they hear the song? What do you want them to think about?
PAUL: I genuinely just love the idea of free interpretation; I never really want to say what the songs are about, so, for example, I like the idea of going into a cinema and watching a random film and not knowing what it’s about, then my response can be pure and real to me, and I want that for the listeners, maybe certain lines of the song hit them in a certain way, maybe a month later, they are numb to that line, but a line they didn’t feel initially, maybe that takes on a new meaning, and you know what, that’s okay that the feelings from the song and towards the song are ever evolving.
Whatever they think about, I just want it to be real to them; I do my best to strive for raw authenticity, and you know, maybe you listen, and for a couple of minutes, you don’t even realize you are being still, and your breathing has slowed, and there is just an amalgamation of emotions etched upon your face.
Q: What’s your favorite part of the song and favorite part about making it? My favorite part is when you dragged out the “I Loved You” part with the beats in between the words toward the beginning.
PAUL: Well, firstly, to your favorite part, I love that too; again, it goes back to the final moments and making an effort to get something out and the bit of time it takes to will the person to get the words out for the last time in between the beats, acting as heartbeats. So that was the idea anyway.
My favorite part never changes, and it’s the whole of the bridge, and without quoting it all, just basically the parts:
“Every day, you made the sun come to life, When I would open my eyes,” and “Every night, when I breathed after twilight, You were putting the stars in the sky.” Now, for me, I love these because you are assigning a meaning to a person from things that will always happen, the sun rising and night time, and in my head I always thought how beautiful is that you get to still wake up and go to sleep with the person still. Plus, to me, it’s just a great callback/building off point from the pre-chorus: “I still, feel you, at every sunset, I still, feel you, at every sunrise, You’re still, with me, every, day, You’re still, with me, every, night.”
Q: How would you describe yourself as an artist? How would you describe Paul?
PAUL: Okay, that is a tricky one, erm, not sure, basically I’m a lyricist first and everything else I just do my best with, whether that is constantly humming to myself what I think the tune might be, certain inflections of words in a particular part of a song etc.
Me, as a person, I am genuinely just an honest guy who has had some interesting obstacles in life; so, to make a long story short, I am quite deaf in my right ear, had some speech issues when I was younger, grew up with Aspergers Syndrome and ADHD, and always seem to think and look at things a little differently and total all that together I was severely bullied, and spent a lot of time on my own, and that allowed me to just observe human behavior, and the psychology of actions taken and not taken and I guess writing songs to try and filter through my “emotions” when I was younger.
I was once told that I lacked empathy, and I didn’t really think anything of it when I was younger, but as I got older, it started to break me a little, and
I realized I was imitating emotions to fit in etc and that when “real” things happen in your life, then you soon know the difference between imitation and really feeling something, and yeah I made a promise to myself that I would write songs one, because they gave me comfort, and two I just loved music and had many influences and I just always wondered, imagine if “this music hero of mine” covered one of my songs, so yeah I just love music, but more specifically lyrics, and how they can mold and shape the journey the music will take you on.
Q: When did you realize music is something you love doing?
PAUL: I can’t pinpoint an exact moment before real anxieties hit me in my teens; I loved singing, and I remember being in a production of “Oliver Twist” and just thought, this is interesting, the rehearsals etc and then entering a local radio competition for singing, but like I said before sometimes a few obstacles in life, just hit you at once and it got to a point where I made sure if I wasn’t going to be on stage, I wasn’t going to sing, then I would write lyrics that I wish I could sing.
And just music always seemed to be there for me, whether it was my dad introducing me to music beyond my years, e.g. punk movement and 70’s/80’s music. My grandparents listened to music from the 60s.
These all played their part, and love that from those points, I was open to listening to all genres and just gravitated to songs that told some kind of story or at least expressed a particular emotion and the bravery to approach a song with true honesty about a real feeling that felt genuine to them in the moment.
So, for example (and I don’t mean to self-plug, just the only example I can think of right now), in a song upcoming on my 2nd album, I have these lines: “Now I’m trying to keep hold of those, that I will never love. I feel so alone that I’m trying to replace the ones that have gone.” See what I mean about bravery and honesty, in a sense you shouldn’t say that and admit to keeping hold of people you don’t love, but to the person saying it, it’s true to them. I hope that answer made sense.
Q: Who are your influences?
PAUL: Well, I think before I rattle off a list of answers, I always remember being mesmerized by Jeff Wayne’s Musical Version of The War of the Worlds, even now I can just put that on, whether it’s the journey as a whole or just the song “Forever Autumn.” In terms of other music artists, you can guess how eclectic my iPod is, obviously classics like Bowie, Elvis, Elton, Queen, Beatles etc, but my go-to is the Lighthouse Family. I explained glimpses of my childhood, and I just found that when I listened to the Lighthouse Family, it didn’t matter my mood or circumstances. All their songs could be played, and I always found that quite enchanting as I’m not sure that works with a lot of artists.
Some others would be Tom Jones, Bob Marley, Eminem, The Verve, Coldplay, Adele, Duffy, Amy Winehouse, Joss Stone, U2, The Corrs, David Gray, Supertramp, Dua Lipa, Rihanna, Bee Gees, Robbie Williams, So there are some others, and I’m open to all, but predominately you will see all the above, but you will always find British artists populating my iPod, there will always be some Lily Allen, Jorja Smith, The Streets, Dido etc. and it’s funny there is always a funny self-fantasy where the living artists on this list, one day cover a song of mine or collab, for example, this song of mine in particular that we’ve been talking about “ (Remember) I Loved you”. I was listening to Tom Jones doing a live version of a song of his from about 3 years ago, and the aged vulnerability in his powerful voice made me think, can you imagine if he did a stripped-back version of this song, now that would be something special.
Q: What’s your biggest goal in life and as a musician?
PAUL: Well, I’m still very much more comfortable being on my own and just working hard, so I have no desire for fame etc but want success, so basically my goal would be that I think my skill is lyric writing, and I believe that it is way above anything else in life that I am capable of. So would love to write for others, or for them to ask for my input, that would be cool.
