The Midnight is a band that has enjoyed significant growth in support in recent years, with their synthwave music proving highly popular.
Having launched in 2012, the band – made up of singer-songwriter Jamison Tyler Lyle and producer Tim Daniel McEwan – released a third studio album in 2020, entitled Monsters.
Among their most noticeable songs is Lost Boy, which originates from their 2018 album Kids. In this article, we take a look at the meaning behind this song.
Lost Boy Lyrics
We were the monsters and fire-breathers
We were the quiet sunrise leavers
You were a good girl, what could I do?
I was a lost boy when I met you
Hold me til I’m not lonely anymore
It’s only the crashing of the ocean to the shore
‘Cause in the dark there are no strangers
There are no strangers at all
‘Cause in the dark there are no strangers
There are no strangers at all
I was a lost boy when I met you
I was a lost boy, was a lost boy
I was a lost boy when I met you
I was a lost boy, was a lost boy
I was a lost, there are no strangers anymore
I was a lost boy, was a lost boy
I was a lost boy when I met you
I was a lost boy, was a lost boy
I was a lost, there are no strangers anymore
We were the rebels, lone survivors
We were the cult of deep sea divers
We were young once then we grew old
We were shining, we were fool’s gold
Hold me til I’m not lonely anymore
It’s only the crashing of the ocean to the shore
‘Cause in the dark there are no strangers
There are no strangers at all
‘Cause in the dark there are no strangers
There are no strangers at all
I was a lost boy when I met you
I was a lost boy, was a lost boy
I was a lost boy when I met you
I was a lost boy, was a lost boy
I was a lost, there are no strangers anymore
I was a lost boy, was a lost boy
I was a lost boy when I met you
I was a lost boy, was a lost boy
I was a lost, there are no strangers anymore
‘Cause in the dark there are no strangers
There are no strangers at all
I was a lost boy
‘Cause in the dark there are no strangers
There are no strangers at all
I was a lost boy
‘Cause in the dark there are no strangers
There are no strangers at all
Song Meaning
For many, this song has a very clear and heartwarming meaning to it. Lost Boy appears to be a song about love, as so many excellent songs are!
As the song title shows, this song is about a “lost boy”, someone who appears to be lost in life, and perhaps going through a difficult time. The song is sang in the past tense, with the person seemingly reminiscing about the past.
It seems that the person is remembering a past partner, judging by the common line of “I was a lost boy, when I met you”. This seems to be sang in an affectionate way, as if the person acknowledges that the person they met helped them to stop feeling “lost”.
Arguably, this describes that feeling when someone who is going through a difficult time first meets “that” person – the one that seems to have all the answers to your problems, makes you feel better about yourself, and generally gives the person light in an otherwise bleak world.
This is reinforced through lines such as “hold me, ’til I’m not lonely anymore” and “we were young once then we grew old”. Again, the person involved is looking back on the past, thinking about this person that stopped them from being a lost boy.
Talking about how “in the dark there are no strangers at all”, this could be interpreted as the couple sleeping side-by-side in the dark, or alternatively, as the person ruminating at night, alone by themselves, with only the other person to think of.
It isn’t entirely clear how the story ends up between the couple, but having such a question left to the reader/listener is great – as it helps us to make our own conclusions.
Generally, the songs from The Midnight are upbeat, so we are going to go ahead and presume that the couple lived happily ever after, and that the person is looking back on when their life changed for the better.
The Takeaway
The great thing about songs like this is that it is up to the viewer to reach their own conclusions.
While we have concluded that the song is positive, it could easily be interpreted as having a sad feeling to it, perhaps the couple split up, leaving the person more lonely than before.
We highly recommend checking out The Midnight’s music, they continue to release some excellent songs!
See The Midnight’s YouTube channel at this link.
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Picture Credit for Title Image: Timothy Chan, Public domain, via Wikimedia Commons. Available: https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/9/96/The_Midnight_-_The_Globe_2017-1118.jpg.
