Dave’s “Selfish” — piano, gravity, and a room that breathes
By Rafi Mercer
I started the day with Dave’s new album, but it was one track that stopped me cold. “Selfish.” The whole record is strong, but this one carries weight, the kind that changes how a room feels. What caught me first was not the lyric or the hook. It was the piano. Simple, deliberate, almost patient to a fault, and it gave me that old sensation I get with Pink Floyd’s “The Great Gig in the Sky.” Not the famous vocal release that people remember, but the piano’s calm insistence underneath it, the way harmony can hold a whole weather system in place. “Selfish” has that kind of gravity. It sets the air, then lets the voice arrive as a passenger rather than a driver.
Listening closely, you can hear how the piano is used like architecture. Chords arrive with a human margin, never metronomic, and the sustain bleeds just enough to suggest space beyond the mics. That space is part of the story. It is the difference between a beat and a breath. The piano narrows the path, then widens it, then leaves a little cliff edge for the voice to step across. It reminds me of the best moments on the Bobby McFerrin and Chick Corea Mozart Sessions, where restraint and dialogue become the performance. A phrase offered, a silence answered, a return to center. “Selfish” sits in that lineage of musical conversation, modern in tone but classical in its discipline.
Dave’s vocal is measured, almost withheld. He does not reach for impact, he waits for it. That is why the piano matters so much here. It is the emotional frame that lets the lyric move without hurry. I kept hearing James Blake’s influence too, not as a copy, more as a sensibility. The way Blake treats negative space, the choice to keep elements spare so nuance can carry meaning, the little ghost textures that sit just on the edge of perception. “Selfish” uses those choices without getting blurry. It stays legible, like a clear room with a single light.
There are echoes in this track that feel intentional. A slight gospel warmth in the voicings, a hint of R&B in the cadence, then the quiet ache that British records sometimes carry when they let weather into the mix. The piano is the anchor throughout. It does what great piano parts do. It holds a pulse that is not strictly time, it is attention. You can stand inside it. You can measure your breath against it. That is why the Pink Floyd memory arrived so quickly. “Great Gig” is a reminder that the foundation can be the feeling, not just the grid. “Selfish” works from the same rule.
I have this habit now, learned from years of listening bars and long nights with good systems. When the piano feels like a room, I turn the volume down first, not up. If the part carries its own air at low level, it will bloom at high level without turning harsh. “Selfish” passes that test. At a whisper, you still hear the felt, the pedal, the tail. Bring it up on a precise system and you get the body of the instrument, not just the keys. That is the sign that the track was built for listening, not skimming.
What I love here is the discipline. Dave could decorate the idea. He could stack vocals, lean into the obvious swell, add weight where the piano leaves space. He does not. He keeps the gravity where it belongs, in the pattern of chords and the patience of the performance. The song moves like someone thinking in real time. Not indecisive, just honest about the distance between feeling and speech. It is a brave way to produce a track in a climate that rewards instant impact. It is also why the piece lingers after the last note.
Albums announce themselves. Tracks reveal themselves. “Selfish” is a reveal. It shows the album’s depth without summarizing it. It suggests that Dave is working at the level where tone is narrative and silence is an instrument. It is the kind of track I would play early in an evening at a listening bar, after the first pour, before the conversation becomes chatter, when the room is awake but still steady. The piano would set the pace. The voice would deliver the thought. The system would do the rest.
If you listen today, give it the courtesy of stillness. Put “Selfish” on without distraction. Notice how the harmonies carry the weather of the track, how the voice leans into the chords and then away, how the final tail leaves you in the doorway rather than the street. Some songs push you on. This one lets you stand still and feel the floor.
Rafi Mercer writes about the spaces where music matters. For more stories from Tracks & Tales, subscribe, or click here to read more.
