You're listening to Song Exploder,
where musicians take apart their songs and piece by piece tell the story of how they were made.
I'm Rishikesh Hirway.
This episode contains explicit language.
Sam Smith is a Grammy and Oscar-winning singer and songwriter from London, England.
Their first album, In the Lonely Hour, came out in 2014.
It went quintuple platinum in the U.S.
And the biggest hit from that album is the song Stay With Me,
which has over 2 billion streams on Spotify alone.
For this episode, in honor of the song's 10th anniversary,
I talked to Sam about how Stay With Me was made.
I also talked to Sam's frequent collaborator, Jimmy Napes,
who is an award-winning producer and songwriter as well.
The two of them tell the story of how the song began and how it turned into the hit that it became.
And then, years later, how it changed again.
My name is Sam Smith.
Before writing this song, I was working in a bar for about two,
three years post-leaving school, trying to make money and trying to pay my rent in London.
Singing and performing was something I always loved.
But at that time, I remember being in my flat and I made a pact with myself.