Leah Rose

The growing up process is a slow one.

At what point did you realize, I'm writing a love song for Julia?

Do you have a favorite part of the song?

It's very much like what song are you choosing for the first dance at your wedding?

Such a beautiful song. Again, that's If I Didn't Know You By Now by Rukin. I'm not sure if Ben's going to convince Justin that folk is the best genre for love songs. But in a minute, Malcolm Gladwell weighs in, and he gets us thinking about this question in an entirely different way.

Yeah, yeah, yeah.

I think it's so funny. I mean, you know that I love a sad song over a happy song, and I'll take a depressed, unrequited love song over a happy over-the-moon love song any day.

And I'm Leah Rose.

Yeah, I know. I'm just going to keep it open. I'm keeping it open for new experiences. And I'm going to sit here and I'm going to celebrate Valentine's Day by listening to songs that make me cry.

Wait, I just saved a playlist and this is real. I just saved a playlist from Spotify called Classics for Crying. So I'm getting that queued up.

Special thanks to Ben Natapoffrey, Malcolm Gladwell, Costanza Gallardo, Owen Miller, and Eric Sandler.

And I'm Leah Rose. Happy Valentine's Day.

And then it just gets dirtier and dirtier as the years go on. And then we land at the thong song.

I love Cisco too. R&B does do love very, very well. But there's other genres too. I mean, look at Dolly Parton on Jolene. She's begging and she's pleading and she's out of her mind. Please don't take my man.

Whitney. Whitney. Speaking of Whitney, someone who could sing anyone's song and make it sound phenomenal. This makes me think of the interview you did with Babyface for Broken Record back in 2023. And he wrote some of Whitney's biggest hits.

Yes. That was such a great interview.

Let's hear some of that.

That's right. This is our Valentine's Day special. And today, to celebrate the music we love, Justin and I are going to do what we love, which is argue about music.

We'll also hear from Ben Nadif-Hafri, the sometimes host of The Last Archive, about a love song he wrote that's so good it helped him score his forever Valentine.

That's star Pushkin producer and sometimes host of The Last Archive, Ben Nadif Hafri.

Me too.

But first, Justin, I'm going to ask you what I think is a central question of today's episode. I think I know what you're going to say, but out of every genre and subgenre that exists today, which one do you think does love songs the best?

To be honest, I also think that sad songs might make the best love songs. But the real reason I wanted to talk to Ben is because I learned at our holiday party that he also has a second life as a musician and as a songwriter with the band Rukin.

So this is our Valentine's Day special, and I was tipped off by our producer, Izzy, about a love song that you wrote a couple years ago, and it actually ended up having sort of like a big impact on your life. So I wanted to ask you about this song, If I Didn't Know You By Now. So set the stage for us. How did this song come to be?