“Stay Awake, No More Dreams,” by Steven Lipsticks and His Magic Band, is a fine example of Underwear Music: a song that a guy writes and records sitting on his bed in his underwear following a breakup. The phenomenon of Underwear Music is a Guy Thing. After a breakup, Guys lock themselves away and write sad songs. Girls go down to Chili’s with their friends, knock back a few margaritas, and talk about it. Females are most creative when they are happy. Males hit their creative peak when they are sad.

Guest Rebuttal by the Raccoonette: “We do the Girls Night Out margarita thing, but it doesn’t have to be at Chili’s. We just want EVERYONE to know what a loser this guy is. And after we put away a few pitchers of strawberry margaritas, we all go back to someone’s apartment, put on lingerie, and have a pillow fight.”

OK, she didn’t actually say that part about the pillow fight. What she said was, “We have a digital purging and delete every text, email, and picture with this guy’s name or face on it.” So while the Female is deleting, the Male is creating. Steven Lipsticks holds down both sides of the equation; he multi-tasks the breakup by writing a song AND deleting the texts.

I need to be more concrete
Now the problem is paying the rent
And other thoughts to delete
And delete every message you send

“Stay Awake, No More Dreams” is a demo version of “Stay Away from My Dreams,” released in 2015 on Steven Lipsticks and His Magic Band’s self-titled debut album. The demo and final version are similar; “Stay Away from My Dreams” benefits from the addition of simple synthesizer and slide guitar lines.

“Stay Awake, No More Dreams” is from the new three-track EP, Jar of Poetry Revisited / 52″. The EP also contains demo versions of two other tracks on the 2015 album, “Jar of Poetry Revisted,” and “99”” (titled “52”” on the new release). Trivia fact: The original demo of “Jar of Poetry Revisited” appeared on the previous album as a hidden track. Listen to “Outro (AKA Clapping Hands).” The titled song occupies the first one-minute-twenty of the track. Then we are presented with a full minute of dead silence before “Jar of Poetry,” here a short acoustic ballad, makes an unannounced appearance. The accompanying hiss is the computer’s fan, which Steven described as “a great protagonist of the first demo.”

Steven Lipsticks is Stefano Rossetti of Bologna, Italy. His Magic Band is also Stefano Rossetti with a little help from his friends. Stefano writes the music and lyrics, and plays most of the instruments. We have been happy to previously feature a review of his first album, which included a great interview. And more recently his new single, “Opinions,” was a song of the day.

Recordings by Steven Lipsticks and His Magic Band are available for streaming and download on Bandcamp and Soundcloud. And be sure to follow Steven Lipsticks and His Magic Band on Facebook, and YouTube.