Stick Season (We'll All Be Here Forever), a review

Stick Season by Noah Kahan has quickly become one of my favourite albums of all time. Despite its recent release, it was difficult not to become utterly captivated by Noah's beautiful, yet heart-wrenching, storytelling. With his ever growing popularity, after the release of a few snippets of his songs, it is safe to say the wait was absolutely worth it.

Stick Season, the deluxe version, was released June 9th and immediately wrapped itself around my heart. The album itself is composed by 21 songs, each with their own intricate story and plot line.

The first time I pressed play, it was around 8:05 in the morning, the sun had barely risen and I was sitting in the back of a car. I had been so desperately waiting to listen to Dial Drunk, a song that had been hyped all over the internet (as it should be, honestly), but I wasn't prepared for all the other songs that were about to grip my emotions and hold them hostage for approximately 1 hour and 23 minutes. Noah's writing is impressive and raw. In a way, he becomes a vessel for everything we've ever felt as human beings, although some stories are more specific than others. Let's unwrap that and delve deeper into his songwriting, focusing on some of his many songs (numbered based on their position in the album).

1. Northern Attitude: This track is a reflection on what it was like growing up in New England, notorious for being cold and dark, especially during the winter. He describes his feeling of isolation, but also blames it on his upbringing. He deepens the thought as he describes what it's like settling into a routine and how it can lead to you falling short in your relationships with other people or in your expectations for yourself ("You build a boat, you build a life / You lose your friends, you lose your wife / You settle in to routine / Where are you? What does it mean?"). Furthermore, Noah describes what it's like living with the fear that you'll never truly amount to something, but also the fear of truly living or even dying ("Scared to live, scared to die").

2. Stick Season: Noah reflects on a past relationship, one he has yet to get over, but feels the other side has already done so ("Because your voice trailed off exactly as you passed my exit sign"). He also describes what it's like to love and hate the place you're from, especially when you see everyone around you move on and you're still stuck in the same place ("And I love Vermont, but it's the season of the sticks (...) I'll drink alcohol 'til my friends come home for Christmas"). However, he also touches on the mental health problems he's been battling, specifically depression and anxiety, that led to him trying to cover them up with other things, like touring and drinking. He mostly mentions his father in the lyrics, thinking back on the discomfort he felt seeing the effects it had on his father, but also on himself ("So I thought that if I piled something good on all my bad / That I could cancel out the darkness I inherited from my dad").

3. All My Love: Through All My Love we discover even more about Noah and his past. In the pre-chorus Kahan mentions Retrograde, which he later revealed was a song he used to listen to in the driveway of his father's home, and remembers those moments sitting in the car with a person he no longer knows, even though their name still weighs on him and his mind ("We once sang / Retrograde, we'd shake the frame of your car / Now I know your name / But not who you are"). Noah deepens the hold this relationship has on him, saying he never truly changed and is still waiting for the person with all his love for them intact ("If you need me, dear / I'm the same as I was, it's all okay / There ain't a drop of bad blood, it's all my love / You got all my love"). However, he also deepens the meaning by mentioning his battle with depression, which he was medicated for during this time, isolating himself even more, but never truly changing his essence ("I'm still out here / With all the pills and the dogs").

4. She Calls Me Back: This song is definitely one of my favourites with how beautifully it's written, but also the meaning it transmits. The first time I heard this song, I was completely breathless. Kahan describes the distance between two people, more specifically him and another person. The song immediately begins with various heart wrenching phrases: "There was Heaven in your eyes, I was not baptised", meaning he will never be able to feel her love, especially if she was Heaven and he was never baptised, which is believed to be necessary to get to Heaven. He describes her as unobtainable, despite his desire. Throughout the song you can sense the despair from his singing and the attachment he feels towards her, but still describes the both of them as parallel lines, two people who will never intertwine and meet.

5. Come Over: Personally, I believe the singer is trying to convince someone to come over, despite being known as the sad kid in the sad looking house. However, he doesn't refrain from reminding listeners that the house may look run-down, but it still feels like his safe space and protection, like it's more than enough. He goes on to repeat how "uncool" he feels, but has faith that one day he'll become someone everyone else will want, eluding materialistic things to the feeling of validation. He ends the song the same way he begins it, telling the other person that he feels he's losing their interest, but what does it matter if life ends with us being forgotten ("Don't you know there's a coffin buried under the garden / It was there when we got here, will be there when we leave").

6. New Perspective: I found this song quite interesting, especially the way Noah describes how his town "evolved", or at least thinks it did. He mentions how a bit of change can make Ohio feel like it's central park or how a Target in the intersection attracts people to it, even calling that section of town "downtown". However, he repeats how much he dislikes this whole idea that the town has changed because the people in it have done everything but change, they're all the same as they used to be ("You and all of your new perspective now / Wish I could shut it in a closet / And drag you back down").

7. Everywhere, Everything: Kahan has come out to say this song was written during the COVID-19 lockdowns and mentions how oblivious everyone was to this impending event, until it actually happened ("We didn't know that the sun was collapsing / 'Til the seas rose and the buildings came crashing"). He does, however, also mention the beauty of sharing an apocalyptic type event with someone special. In his words: Everywhere, everything, I wanna love you / 'Til we're food for the worms to eat / 'Til our fingers decompose, keep my hands in yours. One of the most interesting metaphors in this song is in the second verse, where Noah talks about dog-earring a page in a book, meaning he's pausing his life, just like you would mark the page you're on before putting down a book.

8. Orange Juice: When I first heard this song I imagined it as a conversation between two people, the singer and the person who has been battling for sobriety. The "narrator" in the song is describing how selfish he felt initially because, instead of asking where they had gone, he'd been too focused on their return ("Feels like I've been ready for you to come home / For so long / That I didn't think to ask you where you'd gone"). Later in the song, he reflects back on a crash in 2002, that led to the other person concealing inner anger, due to all the emotional trauma they went through. In a way, this section of the story line leads to the conflict between the two "characters". The narrator feels conflicted because he feels like the person before them thinks everyone else moved on, when in reality the narrator has also been struggling with his sobriety and feels that their friendship is being weighed down because he's only seen as a reminder of the grief ("And you know I'd say, the last time I drank / I was face down, passed out there in your lawn / Are we all just crows to you now? / Are we all just pulling you down?").

10. Growing Sideways: This song is an extremely raw description of what it's like going to therapy, how it has its highs and lows. Noah describes how helpful it was in the beginning, before the conversations became trivial and he finally decided he was "cured" to get out of it. As it goes on, he reflects on his generational trauma, enlisting reasons he's felt angry during his life ("I'm still angry at my parents for what their parents did to them / But it's a start"). However, he grows accustomed to feeling half empty and decides to ignore his problems. He decides he's just going to keep on driving, even though he's terrified he's never really going to meet his true self. He feels rushed, but also helpless ("Why is pain so damn impatient? Ain't like it's got a place to be / Keeps rushin' me").

15. Your Needs, My Needs: To me, the narrator is demonstrating the ways in which they are incompatible, despite his love for the other person. In a way, this song feels like their last interaction, their final goodbye. The narrator describes the other person as a flower and a work of art, making it even harder to let them go. He also goes into a further explanation of the aftermath, the alcohol, the weight loss, the medication and the deadweight of everything they could have been, but never were ("Dead, dead weight / Your life, your dreams / Your mind, your needs"). This last part is certainly the most shocking, as the music builds up into a scream, almost as if the narrator is erupting at the seems. Spiral out, try and float.

16. Dial Drunk: The narrator describes drunk calling his ex, as he keeps them in his emergency contacts. In his drunken haze, he admits to not feeling proud of his past actions and of who he has been ("I ain't proud of all the punches that I've thrown / In the name of someone I no longer know / For the shame of being young, drunk and alone"). Having his ex's number as an emergency contact was an attempt at getting to talk to them, which ultimately fails when they hang up on him. As the story progresses, we discover that while he would die for the person in question, he would never truly live for them, no matter how he felt towards them ("I dial drunk, I'll die a drunk, I'll die for you"). However, he stills demonstrates conflicting feelings and shows he's willing to do anything just to attempt to call them again ("I'll change my faith, I'll kiss the badge / Just wait, I swear she'll call me back / Son, why do you do this to yourself?").

19. Call Your Mom: This song emotionally moved me. It feels like an ode to a battle with depression, at the same time that it feels like a message for someone who's struggling with suicidal thoughts. The narrator reminds them that, no matter how much they spiral, there will always be someone on the other side ready to listen to them. He reminds them to not let the darkness fool them, that there will be light at the end of the tunnel ("Don't let this darkness fool you / All lights turned off can be turned on"). He goes further and empathises with the person whose struggling, telling them he's been there too and that he would drive all night to help them, desperately wanting to call their mom for more support ("Oh, dear, don't be discouraged / I've been exactly where you are"). If they could see themselves like this, the narrator reminds, they would have never tried it.

20. You're Gonna Go Far: An ode to those who feel they need to leave their town to grow and to truly discover their true selves. The narrator reminds them, during the chorus, that leaving doesn't have to be a bad thing and that their loved ones won't be angry at them for searching for other forms of happiness ("So, pack up your car, put a hand on your heart / Say whatever you feel, be wherever you are / We ain't angry at you, love / You're the greatest thing we've lost"). He also reminds them that there is no point in living your life waiting to die, you have to live life with meaning, wherever that meaning lies ("Who the hell likes livin' just to die? / You told me you would make a difference"). If you wanna go far, then you gotta go far.

In short, this album bottles up all the contradicting feelings of growing up and growing old, but also what it's like to feel everything and nothing at the same time. It's safe to say Stick Season is a lyrical masterpiece and the thought that is put into each and every word is terrifying, but oh so endearing. Stick Season feels like a warm embrace on a cold winter night or a shoulder to cry on at the right place and at the right time. It's human.