Sing to me now
All the songs that enchanted me then
Only an hour
It’s all I need to be happy again
I’ve been waiting all my life
For you to be here
For you to be here inside
Promise me you won’t cry
Your tears are wasted
Your tears are wasted
Run outside like a child
Dance alone in the rain
I’ve been waiting all my life
For you to be here
For you to be here inside
I wrote this song in the spring of 1996. It came out all in one sitting, words and everything, on a grand piano in a rehearsal room attached to the Sheffield University drama studio. Looking back, it was the beginning of my first purple patch as a songwriter. I first recorded it at the house of my oldest friend, Sian Llewellyn, in Chepstow. Hers is the first piano I ever remember playing as a kid. I then recorded it again in a studio in Temple Bar in Dublin. I was meant to be recording different songs with another old friend, Tom Moore. But he picked up a bizarre infection in his ankle (I still don’t know quite why) and I used the time to get this song down. I suspect the recording that’s on The Fire Stairs will be my last and best attempt at getting the song right. I changed the key to one I could sing, which was a big step forward. Apart from that, my favourite bits of the recording are the beautiful pedal steel part from Spencer Cullum, the haunting backing vocal from Anna-Louise Maloney and the Take That-inspired question and answer vocal line on the last chorus by, well, me.
