Moonlit Floor
by Lisa

Album: Alter Ego (2024)
Charted: 121
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Songfacts®:

  • "Moonlit Floor" finds Lisa in love with a debonair green-eyed Frenchman while in Paris. She wasn't in the City of Light on some romantic quest. No, she was there for work. But as these things often go, business quickly turned into pleasure.
  • During the chorus Lisa interpolates Sixpence None the Richer's 1998 hit "Kiss Me," replacing their hook with her own Parisian twist. So instead of:

    Kiss me beneath the milky twilight
    Lead me out on the moonlit floor


    We get:
    Kiss me under the Paris twilight
    Kiss me out on the moonlit floor
  • This isn't Lisa's first time borrowing an American pop hit. On BlackPink's "Pink Venom," she playfully slips in a line from Rihanna's 2005 smash "Pon De Replay."
  • Singer-songwriter Jessie Reyez wrote "Moonlit Floor" with producer Ryan "Rykeyz" Williamson, who worked with her on her 2022 Yessie album. Sixpence's Matt Slocum, who penned "Kiss Me," is also credited.
  • Reyez and Rykeyz wrote the song at Chalice Studios in Los Angeles during a late-night session. Rykeyz was tinkering on a Roland Juno-106 synthesizer - an old '80s classic. He recalled to Billboard how as he started to play, "Jessie immediately started writing as I built up the production."

    "When she sang it down, I thought it was so fresh but thought it needed something to take the chorus overboard," he said. "I jokingly started singing 'Kiss Me' by Sixpence None the Richer."

    "Jessie flipped out and made the most amazing lyrical flip on the song," Rykeyz added. "We were both big fans of the original ["Kiss Me"] and felt it was exactly what the song needed to take it to that next level."
  • Getting permission to use that "Kiss Me" hook wasn't easy. Reyez had originally planned to include "Moonlit Floor" on Yessie, but her label couldn't clear the sample. So Reyez did her own internet detective work to track down Sixpence None the Richer's singer, Leigh Nash, and get the green light.

    Her Instagram sleuthing paid off, and once the interpolation was cleared, Reyez tucked it away in her "songs to pitch" folder. That's how it ended up in Lisa's hands.
  • Fans are convinced Lisa is singing about her rumored boyfriend, Frédéric Arnault, the CEO of LVMH Watches. Sure, he has green eyes, but so do plenty of other French men. It is likely Lisa was attracted to the song because of its French romantic interest.
  • Lisa gave "Moonlit Floor" its live debut at the Global Citizen Festival in New York City's Central Park on September 28, 2024, before officially releasing it on October 3.

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