Stay (I Missed You) by Lisa Loeb & Nine Stories

About

“Stay (I Missed You)” was Lisa Loeb’s first and breakthrough single. The song reached the top of the Billboard Hot 100 chart in August 1994, making her the first unsigned artist to reach #1 . According to The Billboard Book Of Number One Hits, the song was written after an argument with her boyfriend. At the time, a friend of Loeb told her Daryl Hall was looking for songs for a solo project. Though her opportunity to submit a song fell through, she completed the song with Hall in mind. Later when Loeb’s friend Ethan Hawke was filming Reality Bites, he told her the music supervisors were looking for a song titled “I’m Nothing” and he encouraged her to write one. The supervisors chose a different “I’m Nothing” but asked Loeb for more music. At Hawke’s suggestion, she submitted “Stay” and RCA Records soon left Loeb a voicemail asking to include it on the soundtrack to Reality Bites. Instead of sending one or two songs to radio stations to promote the soundtrack, RCA sent the entire collection of songs for the film. At first, radio stations like KRBE in Houston and WPRT in New Jersey added “Stay”. Then, as more stations also began adding it, RCA officially released it as a single and Hawke directed its music video. Still without an official record deal when the song topped the Hot 100, several labels (including RCA) began courting Loeb to sign with them. She chose Geffen Records and released Tails the following year, which included “Stay” as its closing track.