B-Side Guys

The bridge of PepeTheMenace’s “Taylor” breaks the fourth wall with devastating precision. Taylor herself interrupts the song to tell Pepe exactly what’s wrong: “I know you wrote this song about me / But I only saw you for one night / And I just think it’s a little bit ridiculous / That, you know, you keep putting lyrics / To all these one night stands.” It’s the kind of reality check that should end the song, except Pepe immediately contradicts her own rejection—”Cause I don’t want you, but I need you”—revealing that she’s as trapped in the delusion as he is.

The Canadian folk-rocker who describes himself as “a professional at grabbing life by the balls” spends “Taylor” documenting the opposite: someone so desperate for connection that a single encounter becomes material for eternal devotion. “You went from whoever you were to just the start of a song,” he admits in the opening, acknowledging that Taylor’s actual identity matters less than what she represents—escape from being “an asshole” and “a weirdo” addicted to a feeling he experienced once.

The religious imagery throughout—angels rising, seeing devils through eyes, singing into hearts—elevates a one-night stand into a spiritual experience, which is either sincere or pathological depending on your sympathy for the narrator. When Pepe sings “I’ve been hoping that I can love you till I die,” the repetition in the outro makes it sound less like romance and more like a curse he can’t break.

Taylor tried to tell him the truth about what this was. He wrote a folk rock ballad about it anyway. The fact that he includes her objections in the song itself suggests he knows she’s right but plans to keep doing it regardless.