40) Where Are You Now

Hello and welcome to Learning English with Lyrics! I am your host Jake, and today we are discussing the song "Where Are You Now" by Lost Frequencies and Calum Scott. I don't really have much more to say today, so let's jump right into it!

This is a pretty fun song that I keep hearing everywhere, so it's probably time to talk about some of the lyrics! The song is about someone who can't stop thinking about another person. Their brain can't stop remembering this other person. This is seen in the chorus with the line "You're just like my favorite song going 'round and 'round my head". The idea here is of a song that you just can't stop singing. We say that a song is "stuck" in your head, when you just can't stop thinking about it. This happens a lot! I often have a song stuck in my head and can't get rid of it no matter what I do! The worst is when it's not your favorite song, but instead a song that annoys you. My kids often listen to children's songs that just get irritating after a while. Yet, the songs manage to "stick" in my head. Did anyone else have a kid who was obsessed with Baby Shark? What a nightmare! When a song gets stuck in your head very easily, we say that song is "catchy". A "catchy" song gets "stuck" in your head. Does that make sense so far? What is a song that's been stuck in your head this week? Send me a message and tell me about it!

In this song, he describes the memory of this person as "going 'round and 'round" his head. The word "'round" here is a shortened version of the word "around". When something is "going around" something else, that means it is circling, or making a loop of that thing. For example, you can go "around" a race track. The phrase "around and around" normally refers to a loop that goes on for a long time. If I say I walked "around and around" looking for a donut shop, that means I walked for a long time, probably in a kind of loop.

So this person is "stuck" in his head, their memory is looping around his thoughts over and over again.

We'll look at one last phrase before we finish today. One of the first lines saying "Five days on the freeway/Riding shotgun with you". A freeway is just a large road, so it seems like he's describing some kind of long road trip with this person. The interesting phrase here though is "riding shotgun". A shotgun of course is a type of weapon, a gunm primarily used for hunting. So what does it mean to "ride shotgun", that's sort of a strange image isn't it? Well, bizarrely, it means to sit in the seat next to the driver of the car. In an American vehicle, this would be the seat in the front, on the right side. It sounds strange, but that's what it means! It no doubt comes from the days of horse drawn carriages, where a guard might sit next to the driver with a shotgun in his hand to protect it. In modern day, a common children's game when getting into a car, is to yell "I call shotgun!" which means you get to sit in the front passenger seat next to the driver, a precious and coveted position for kids everywhere.

Well, that's all we have for today! I'll talk to you soon!