Danny ClinchLukas Graham’s first hit “7 Years” was an intensely personal song inspired by the death of the father of the band’s lead singer, Lukas Graham Forchhammer. The band’s latest single also was inspired by the passing of Lukas’ dad, but he says this one is a song that everyone can relate to — because he doesn’t specifically refer to his dad in the lyrics.
“I think sometimes when you mention your dead parents in a song, it locks the song to mean just that,” Lukas tells ABC Radio. “And that’s what I like about ‘You’re Not There’…anybody can relate. If you lost somebody, you can relate.”
“If you’ve lost a pet… if you’re a seven-year-old girl and you lose a cat, that’s going to be a heartfelt loss,” Lukas continues. “That’s going to be that girl’s one-hundred percent. My hundred percent is losing my father.”
And that’s why, Lukas says, “Writing ‘You’re Not There’ was like a crown jewel: writing such an emotional song without even mentioning my father.”
The song certainly is emotional, with lyrics like, “You’re not there/To share in my success and mistakes/Is it fair?/You’ll never know the person I’ll be/You’re not there/With me.”
However, there’s no question about who the song is about. The lyric video, first premiered on People.com, is nothing but images of Lukas’ dad, Eugene, posing with Lukas, his siblings, his mom and his friends, and then slowly fading out of all those photos. Eugene died in 2012, and his loss is even more poignant, since Lukas himself just became a father in September.
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