‘Mid-Twenties Crisis’ by Dylan Marlowe - Lyrics & Meaning

On June 28th, 2024, before we'd even received Dylan Marlowe's official debut album announcement, the ‘Record High’ crooner surprised fans with a lengthy Instagram post explaining how he landed on the title for the project. The song that inspired the name of the record, ‘Mid-Twenties Crisis’, was the final track to be written for the album.

Marlowe reflected, “This is the realest song I’ve ever written. My record was finished, me and Joe Fox were working on final mixes and I couldn’t come up with what I wanted to name the album. We were coming up on the final days of having to turn it in and I had nothing. This is my first record so I wanted the title to be special”.

The Georgia prodigy recalled, “So I prayed for at least 2 months straight every day ‘God what do you want me to name this record’ and finally one morning a few days before we had to turn it in this idea slipped into my mind around 4am. I knew it was perfect for what I had been going through but then decided a title like that needed a song, and a song like that needed to be written by myself. So with one day to spare I sent Joe the work tape I made from the bus on the road, and sang the vocal as soon as I got home before me and [my wife, Nat] went to Alaska last week. I’m so proud of this song and I hope it relates with you guys as well”.

‘Mid-Twenties Crisis’ arrived on streaming platforms on Friday, September 27th in tandem with the album as a whole, with the intricate, acoustic track finding Dylan Marlowe delving into the various ups and downs his 20’s have brought with them so far. The fact that Marlowe has enjoyed a highly successful few years, scoring his first No. 1 as a songwriter (‘Last Night Lonely’ by Jon Pardi) and his first Gold single as an artist (‘Boys Back Home’ with Dylan Scott), makes the vulnerability of ‘Mid-Twenties Crisis’ all the more striking and moving for listeners.

On the sparsely produced ‘Mid-Twenties Crisis’, the spotlight falls unwaveringly on the deeply personal lyrics, with the instrumental remaining stripped-back throughout. Dylan Marlowe's vocals take centre-stage, with the ‘Devil on My Shoulder’ singer-songwriter's heartfelt croons gliding across a gentle, noodling acoustic guitar.

“Why am I comparing myself to everyone else

It feels like I've lost all control of my mind

‘Cause my mental health, has gone down the well

And I couldn't wish it back if I tried

Maybe it's a phase I'm going through

The only explanation left to use is”

The key source of Dylan Marlowe's ‘Mid-Twenties Crisis’ appears to be the feeling that he needs to constantly compare himself to others. Due to social media giving us access to everyone's day-to-day lives, this feels somewhat inescapable in modern society, and Marlowe underlines that this has led to a decline in his mental health.

“I think I'm going through a mid-twenties crisis

I'm 27 and it feels like my life is

Flying by and I don't know where the time has gone

And I still can't tell if I'm one step ahead, or one step behind

Everybody's telling me that I'll be alright

So maybe my thirties are the silver lining

But right now it feels like a mid-twenties crisis”

The 27-year-old inventively describes this as a ‘Mid-Twenties Crisis’, a play on the more commonly discussed ‘mid-life crisis’, which tends to be associated with a sense of sudden distress relating to one's identity between the ages of around 40 and 60.

Arguably the most relatable line here is “I still can't tell if I'm one step ahead, or one step behind”. Marlowe has enjoyed great success in recent years, but what is particularly endearing about this hook is that the fast-emerging artist is experiencing this deep-seated concern in relation to his family life, rather than his career trajectory.

“This life on the road keeps me gone from home

And I hate it for the one I know it hurts the most

‘Cause I know that she would probably be

Better if she wasn't living with my ghost, oh, oh

Lately that's what keeps me up at night, oh, oh

So baby I apologise”

This idea is explicated more lucidly in the second verse, during which Dylan Marlowe emphasises that he fears his work is causing him to be away from his wife too often.

Marlowe worries that he's ‘behind’ as all his friends have children already, while he spends most weekends away from Nat out on the road, even though he is undoubtedly ‘ahead’ of many peers in terms of the music-based accolades he's accumulated so far.

He evocatively portrays his wife as living with his ghost, emphasising this sense that she sees reminders of his absence everywhere she looks in the house while he's touring.

“I'm the only one of my friends without a car-seat sitting in the backseat of my truck

And lately I've been further from Jesus than I've ever been, but I swear that I'm trying to patch things up, oh, oh”

Here, Dylan Marlowe consolidates this notion that the primary driver behind his ’Mid-Twenties Crisis’ is his anxiety surrounding the right time to have children. He underlines that he's the only one of his friendship circle that doesn't have a booster seat in the back of their truck, due to him not yet having a baby that would require this. He goes on to describe another crucial element of his identity crisis, which is the nagging sense that he's grown “further from Jesus than I've ever been”. Faith is a central source of inspiration across Dylan Marlowe's music, and in this lyric, he determines to improve and ‘patch up’ his relationship with Jesus.

In a 2024 interview with Holler, Dylan Marlowe reflected on how ’Mid-Twenties Crisis’ became the title-track, “I had nothing. I literally had no idea what I was going to name it, and everybody was like, ‘Hey, you've got two weeks until it has to be turned in. We have to have a title’, because they were printing vinyls and getting everything ready. I was praying a bunch about it, and one night I woke up and God, was like, ‘Here's your title’. It suddenly came to me at like 4am one morning”.

Marlowe went on to explain how he still grapples with the temptation to compare himself to fellow artists and other people his age, a key theme of ‘Mid-Twenties Crisis’, “I think it's a lot better than what it was when I wrote that song. It's inevitable. I think everybody probably has to a little bit. I don't really see a world where you don't [compare yourself] unless you're just not on social media or anything”.

“Why am I comparing myself to everyone else

It feels like I've lost all control of my mind

‘Cause my mental health, has gone down the well

And I couldn't wish it back if I tried

-

Maybe it's a phase I'm going through

The only explanation left to use is

-

I think I'm going through a mid-twenties crisis

I'm 27 and it feels like my life is

Flying by and I don't know where the time has gone

And I still can't tell if I'm one step ahead, or one step behind

Everybody's telling me that I'll be alright

So maybe my thirties are the silver lining

But right now it feels like a mid-twenties crisis

-

This life on the road keeps me gone from home

And I hate it for the one I know it hurts the most

‘Cause I know that she would probably be

Better if she wasn't living with my ghost, oh, oh

Lately that's what keeps me up at night, oh, oh

So baby I apologise

-

I think I'm going through a mid-twenties crisis

I'm 27 and it feels like my life is

Flying by and I don't know where the time has gone

And I still can't tell if I'm one step ahead, or one step behind

Everybody's telling me that I'll be alright

So maybe my thirties are the silver lining

But right now it feels like a mid-twenties crisis

-

I'm the only one of my friends without a car-seat sitting in the backseat of my truck

And lately I've been further from Jesus than I've ever been, but I swear that I'm trying to patch things up, oh, oh

-

I think I'm going through a mid-twenties crisis

I'm 27 and it feels like my life is

Flying by and I don't know where the time has gone

And I still can't tell if I'm one step ahead, or one step behind

Everybody's telling me that I'll be alright

So maybe my thirties are the silver lining

But right now it feels like a mid-twenties crisis

My mid-twenties crisis”

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