Blood on Me

Album: Process (2017)
Play Video

Songfacts®:

  • During this brooding track, Sampha sings about running away from something in what appears to be a dream

    I see this lake formin'
    I got lost astray
    In this forest runnin' away
    I slip up, I'm on the edge now
    They see me, and I nearly
    I nearly lose my grip, but you held on to me
    And you shake me, and tell me that I'm okay


    He explained to Genius:
    "The writing is not sensical. At the end of each verse, someone is waking me up. There is that comforting person, someone waking me up out of the dream. And it's more like the visual I imagined. The thing of being shaken or dragged. So as much as it is comforting, it is also like violent actions as well. It's more so how I see it.

    I write things like a movie scene. I kind of see the camera angle, and there is someone sort of shaking me out - a birds eye view of my bed. So there is that thing of someone there to save you from yourself. Or to wake you up out of the dream. It's like a dog chasing its tail. You never really know where it ends."
  • Sampha recalled the story of the song:

    "I was in the studio with this guy called Radai McDonald. He was helping me engineer and ended up co-producing my record with me. And we were recording a really long piano take. It was like 20, 30 minutes of piano playing and this song just came out of that. I kind of murmured the lyrics, and the hook was in there, and it sort of just came out.

    I remember in the studio, we had like a projection on the piano I was playing. There was waves crashing, and we were watching Ghost In the Shell, and all these things. It just evoked this feeling. I just imagined me running away from, I don't know, something. That was like the first lyric: 'I swear they smell the blood on me.' So I built the song around that."

Comments

Be the first to comment...

Editor's Picks

Justin Timberlake

Justin TimberlakeFact or Fiction

Was Justin the first to be Punk'd by Ashton Kutcher? Did Britney really blame him for her meltdown? Did his bandmates think he was gay?

80s Video Director Jay Dubin

80s Video Director Jay DubinSong Writing

Billy Joel and Hall & Oates hated making videos, so they chose a director with similar contempt for the medium. That was Jay Dubin, and he has a lot to say on the subject.

John Waite

John WaiteSongwriter Interviews

"Missing You" was a spontaneous outpouring of emotion triggered by a phone call. John tells that story and explains what MTV meant to his career.

Songs in Famous Movie Scenes: Tarantino Edition

Songs in Famous Movie Scenes: Tarantino EditionMusic Quiz

Whether he's splitting ears or burning Nazis, Quentin Tarantino uses memorable music in his films. See if you can match the song to the scene.

Don Brewer of Grand Funk

Don Brewer of Grand FunkSongwriter Interviews

The drummer and one of the primary songwriters in Grand Funk talks rock stardom and Todd Rundgren.

Ben Kowalewicz of Billy Talent

Ben Kowalewicz of Billy TalentSongwriter Interviews

The frontman for one of Canada's most well-known punk rock bands talks about his Eddie Vedder encounter, Billy Talent's new album, and the importance of rock and roll.