Music Review: Daniel Bedingfield "Never Gonna Leave Your Side"

Never Gonna Leave Your Side
Album: Gotta Get Thru This
Year:2003

Daniel Bedingfield is desolated without his girlfriend in the familiar ballad "Never Gonna Leave Your Side."

A low, rumbling opens the single. Then somber strings accompany Bedingfield as he compares his heartache to several things. Each cliched simile contains something that is necessary. For instance, a conscience, wings in order to move around, a place to stay. With one simile, though, he is able to say more. He compares himself to a "knight without a sword," meaning he is defenseless. It suggests vulnearability. However, he returns to the cliches as he notes without her it's like "the sky without the sun." Well, many times the sky is gray and cloudy. The sun is a bonus. He says she is his soulmate. " I feel like a song without the words/A man without a soul/A bird without its wings/A heart without a home/I feel like a knight without a sword/The sky without the sun/'Cause you are the one."

In the second verse, the similes get better but remain trite. He's sinking, purposeless, and cannot function. He's nobody without her. His despair his suffocating him.

In the b-section, he adds that she's the one person he lives for. She made him glad to be alive. But with her gone, he's at a loss. "I gotta have a reason to wake up in the morning/You used to be the one that put a smile on my face..."

The strings swell for the chorus as he promises to stay with her. He won't let petty problems between them end their relationship. She makes him feel secure and at peace.


In the second verse, he reveals that he could become a regretful, sour person. He would live in the past and be depressed. A lot of his life has passed by and he's ready to own up to his mistakes. He pleads for her to get back together with him. "...You know I've wasted half the time/And I'm on my knees again/'Till you come to me, yeah."

The b-section is sung again.

The chorus has a slight variation in it. He changes "cause when I'm lying in your arms" to "I lay my head against your heart." He belts with false conviction that he is safe with her.

The original chorus ends the single.

Bedingfield shows some improvement on the weak "Never Gonna Leave Your Side." He's toned his obsessive lyrics and focused on general comparisons. However it sounds like his previous single "If You're Not The One", only with strings.

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