On May 25, 2022, you would have found me outside a bar in Austin, Texas, talking to people I hardly knew.

It was my 25th birthday.

I cannot tell you much about that night. Not because I got blackout drunk.

It was a shitty dive with an outdoor area littered with folding chairs and beer-pong tables. It felt like someone’s parents had gone away for the weekend and half the high school had shown up with cheap beer and flip phones.

At the time, I was working a stressful, boring, dead-end remote job. A group of us had agreed to meet for drinks and finally get to know one another in person.

Everyone kept saying it felt like meeting celebrities. You had seen these people through a screen for months, and now they were standing right in front of you.

None of them knew it was my birthday.

I preferred it that way.

I had a huge crush on one of my coworkers. She had beautiful curly hair and a smile so contagious that you had no choice but to feel happy around her.

It was the kind of crush that made you forget how fearless you were.

The kind that sent you straight back to fifth grade, stumbling over words you had known your whole life.

We were all sitting around a long table surrounded by crooked folding chairs when she opened her bag and pulled out a speaker, but it was not the usual kind. It looked like a heavy, premium guitar amp.

She looked at me, waited a second, and then her face lit up like a Christmas tree.

“Music for a Sushi Restaurant."

Before I could ask what the hell she had just said, she hit play.

And I fell in love with Harry’s House and my coworker at exactly the same time.

I do not have to explain this part to anyone here, but Harry’s House opens with a riff that has neon in its veins. Harry’s voice builds like electricity, ready to set the whole place on fire.

And believe me, it did.

The album played straight through, with no pauses.

For the first time in a while, I was happy.

Then Satellite came on.

The guys around me were still trying to outdo each other at keg stands. People were shouting stories about work across the table. The whole place was loud and messy and alive.

But I was nowhere near that party anymore.

I was somewhere above it, already circling someone who had no idea how much my world revolved around her.

Dedicated to everyone who heard “Satellite” and felt understood.
- Alex

Stream Satellite on Spotify, Apple Music, or your favorite place to get music.