Photo Credit: Bani Amir (@baniamirphotography)
By Alissa Arunarsirakul // March 23, 2020
After Johnny Stimson graduated with a finance degree from Texas A&M University, he opted to pursue a full time music career, which was a shocker to everyone except Stimson himself. Having garnered the mentorship of the one and only Elton John, it’s no secret that the Dallas native is truly one of a kind. More in touch with his feelings than ever before, Stimson pours his heart out in his emotional new single, “Hard to Say Goodbye.”
On “Hard to Say Goodbye,” Johnny Stimson reflected,
“I wrote this song about being homesick before you even leave home. It’s something I feel often since I have been traveling so much. It’s about noticing every bit of perfection on the way out the door and hoping everything will be the same when you get back.”
With the classic R&B soundscape Stimson has always graciously blessed us with, “Hard to Say Goodbye” has the crooner missing his loved ones so much his heart is pained. The subject in question is his wife, Bethany, who Stimson obviously holds very dear in his heart. Between the intoxicating electronics and Stimson’s captivating vocals, “Hard to Say Goodbye” is an earnest tune we wish would never end.
“This was one of those songs where one line was stuck in my head for a while, then one day the whole song just spilled out of me. I spent a big part of last summer in LA and was really missing my wife at home. I kept hearing these little chords and melody, ‘you make it hard to say goodbye… I die a little every time,’ in my head and it became the silent soundtrack to my summer. A few months later, I was working in New York and the verses just poured out in the middle of the night. I wrote exactly about the scene I left back home a few days before.”
The Hidden Hits 