SINGLE REVIEW: STEPHANIE RYANN - FIRST LOVE

Starting 2026 in a similar vein to how she has approached the last eighteen months since rocking on to the #TEAMw21 radar, is Stephanie Ryann with her new single "First Love". It is a cheeky little title as it invites you in to assume that it's going to be some mawkish ditty about a home town boy that she's never forgotten, but no - Stephanie is far too good a songwriter to take us down such a predictable path - this takes the idea of a first love and resets your expectations.

Opening to an acoustic guitar and the faintest shuffling of percussion, Stephanie is quick to point out that in this song she is not the "First Love", by carefully deconstructing a lot of the images, of the type that would be used in such a song if she were.

"I ain't the name you carved on your high school desk

Not the one who have you your first great heartbreak mess

Ain't the one you kissed in your Daddy's old Ford

Not the fight you picked with the words that slipped when the whiskey poured

But you hold me like it's all brand new

But no-one ever loved you like I do"

Stephanie is playing with that trope "You never forget you first", be it love, kiss, cigar and for this song she is saying that time spent with her would evoke that same strength of emotional feelings. To back it up, there are a string of visions perfectly picked to create just that person who would make such an impression. There's the good times of laughter and carefree joie de vivre, followed by a deeper far more intimate personal side where a real connection is being made. Who'd want to forget that fantastic collection of memories.

"I ain't your First Love, but I'm the first one

To make you laugh, till your crying on the front seat

Dancing around like a fool in bare feet

Take you to places only we know

Seeing a side that you never show

You've been in love before but baby not like this

I ain't your First Love, but I'm the one you won't forget"

It is very much about living life in the present not harking back to the past

"Baby I don't care about where we've been

We won't find anything like this again"

By the second chorus the overall sound has started to swell, electric guitar chords heighten the sense of drama

"I'll take what we've got over any first time

Once in a lifetime don't happen twice"

The final chorus ups the ante further as it really reinforces the final line by Stephanie repeating and hovering for a few seconds on the words "I ain't your first love" before nailing home "But I'm the one you won't forget".

It is a smart piece of writing, delivered to a backing that suits perfectly - it is one we won't forget!