Category: Henry

“I feel like I never touched the ground those three days,” John Mayer said in an interview with Rolling Stone, discussing his process for writing this tune. “Like ‘Let’s not worry about what this might draw from and be true to whatever it is.'”

Mayer also confirmed that the ex he is singing about in the lyric is Katy Perry, who he dated for four years, and claimed he spent more hours fine tuning the song than any other he has recorded.

The track is the lead single from the extended EP The Search for Everything: Wave 2, released in 2017. It begins in D and then detours briefly to Bb (and a new half-time feel) for the bridge after the second chorus at 1:47 before seamlessly returning to the chorus in the original key at 2:28.

American singer/songwriter and three-time Grammy winner Michael W. Smith wrote “Place In This World” with Wayne Kirkpatrick and Amy Grant for his sixth studio album, Go West Young Man, released in 1990. The track ended up being his biggest mainstream success, reaching the #6 spot on the Billboard Hot 100.

In an interview with Songfacts, Smith recalled hearing a story about how the song helped someone who was suffering. “Well, the one story I remember vividly, I could still go back to reading the letter, was some young girl, I think she was 18 or 19 years old, and had a horrific childhood in terms of abuse and that sort of thing. And she was suicidal. She gave me this whole story in a two page letter. She was driving down the freeway and listening to a pop radio station and heard ‘Place In This World’ and pulled over and began to weep. And had this encounter with God on the side of the interstate. And her life forever changed. And that’s the one that I’ll never forget. There’s been plenty of people talk about ‘A Place In This World’ but that’s the one letter that I’ll never forget.”

The track begins in B and modulates to C leading into the instrumental bridge at 2:15.

“Mr. Lonely” was the last #1 single released by American singer Bobby Vinton, and the only one that wasn’t a cover.

Vinton wrote the song while serving in the army, and the lyric depicts a solider who is missing home. Epic Records initially gave the song to Buddy Greco to record, but his rendition didn’t crack the top 50 on the charts; when Vinton included the track on his greatest-hits collection in 1964, it quickly became a hit and remained his favorite recording.

The tune begins in E and modulates up to F at 1:26.