As release day approaches, I’ve spent some time reflecting on where the inspiration for Vertigo really came from.
Listeners often ask what artists or albums influenced a project, but inspiration rarely comes from a single source. Music certainly plays a role, but so do movies, television, memories, current events, personal experiences, and even small moments that refuse to leave your imagination.
Looking back now, Vertigo feels like a collection of influences that span generations, genres, and perspectives.
Some are obvious.
Some are hidden in plain sight.
And some only became apparent after the album was finished.
🪩 The Groove of Chic and Nile Rodgers
If there’s one influence listeners may immediately recognize, it’s the impact of Nile Rodgers and Chic.
The groove-driven energy that runs through songs like 1979, Euphoria, and Vertigo owes a great deal to the dance music that dominated the late 1970s and early 1980s.
In particular, 1979 serves as both a love letter to that era and a time machine back to a year filled with unforgettable music.
The references to songs by Blondie, the Bee Gees, Donna Summer, Michael Jackson, and Chic weren’t included simply as nostalgia.
They became part of the storytelling itself.
🎸 Evanescence and Emotional Weight
One song that came from a very different influence is Frantic Heart.
While much of Vertigo leans into melody, groove, and pop accessibility, Frantic Heart draws inspiration from the emotional power and dramatic intensity of Evanescence.
The song explores instability, heartbreak, and the painful realization that caring for someone doesn’t always mean you can save them.
That darker emotional edge creates one of the album’s strongest contrasts.
🎤 Modern Pop Influences
Vertigo was intentionally written and produced as a pop album.
I wanted it to feel current.
I wanted it to feel energetic.
I wanted it to work whether someone was listening alone with headphones, driving with friends, hearing it at a party, or sharing it with people from different generations.
Artists like Billie Eilish and Bruno Mars influenced that thinking.
One embraces atmosphere, vulnerability, and subtle emotional storytelling.
The other embraces hooks, rhythm, melody, and pure pop craftsmanship.
Those influences helped shape my approach to creating songs that feel contemporary while still having something meaningful to say.
🌪️ A Touch of Kelly Clarkson
The title track, Vertigo, reminds me in some ways of the kind of song Kelly Clarkson has always excelled at delivering.
Big melodies.
Strong hooks.
Immediate emotional connection.
A chorus that feels both personal and universal.
While Vertigo ultimately became its own song, that style of emotionally driven pop helped reinforce the direction I wanted the album to take.
🤠 Storytelling Through Song
Another influence came from country music and the artists who understand how to tell a story.
Brooks & Dunn have always had a gift for placing listeners directly inside a moment.
That influence appears throughout Vertigo, particularly in songs like:
🕰️ 1979
👁️ Seen
🌈 No Place Like This
These songs aren’t simply expressing emotions.
They’re telling stories.
📺 Inspiration From Unexpected Places
Not every song title on Vertigo came from a lyric, melody, or musical idea.
Sometimes inspiration arrives from the most unexpected places.
One example is Miles Away.
The title was inspired in part by watching the survival series Alone. As the show shifts between contestants scattered across a vast wilderness, the screen often displays the distance separating one participant from another with captions showing how many miles apart they are.
There was something fascinating about that phrase.
“Miles away.”
On the surface, it describes physical distance.
But the more I thought about it, the more it took on a different meaning.
The song itself became about almost the opposite idea.
Being surrounded by countless people and experiences, yet feeling closest to one person above all others.
What began as a small detail from a television series eventually evolved into one of the album’s most romantic concepts.
🌎 Life in the 2020s
Not all influences on Vertigo came from music or entertainment.
Some came from simply paying attention to the world around us.
The cultural and political atmosphere of the last decade and a half.
The rise of social media.
Questions about authenticity.
Questions about truth.
Questions about who controls the narratives we’re encouraged to believe.
Those ideas found their way into songs like The Wink and Seen, which both explore perception, identity, and the challenge of separating reality from performance.
😉 Narrative and The Wink
The Wink may be the sharpest song on the album.
It questions headlines, algorithms, curated realities, and the subtle ways narratives shape how we see the world.
At times it’s skeptical.
At times it’s sarcastic.
At times it’s uncomfortable.
And that’s exactly why it belongs on this record.
If Vertigo is about perspective, then questioning who shapes that perspective felt like an important part of the journey.
🌈 The Wizard of Oz Connection
One influence that appears late in the album may surprise some listeners.
The Wizard of Oz.
The closing track, No Place Like This, contains intentional nods to:
- The storm
- The disorientation
- The journey
- The shift from black and white to color
- The search for home
Those themes felt perfectly aligned with an album called Vertigo.
After all, both stories involve finding your footing in a world that suddenly feels unfamiliar.
⏳ Songs Nearly 45 Years in the Making
Perhaps the greatest influence on Vertigo is time itself.
Several songs on the album began their lives nearly 45 years ago:
❄️ Avalanche
❤️ Obsession
🔀 Turn of Events
💔 Frantic Heart
🎲 Calculated Risk
Revisiting these songs wasn’t about preserving them exactly as they were.
It was about understanding what they meant now.
The younger songwriter supplied the original ideas.
The older songwriter supplied the perspective.
The songs remained.
The meaning evolved.
Finding the Balance
If there’s one thing that ties all of these influences together, it’s balance.
There’s a youthful exuberance running throughout Vertigo.
The excitement of discovery.
The thrill of possibility.
The energy that comes from falling in love with an idea, a person, or a dream.
But beneath that energy are reflections on memory, identity, vulnerability, uncertainty, human connection, and the strange world we find ourselves navigating in 2026.
Looking back, I think Vertigo became a conversation between different eras of music, different forms of entertainment, different perspectives, and even different versions of myself.
It looks backward.
It looks forward.
And occasionally it spins somewhere in between.
Almost There
In just a few days, these influences, stories, questions, memories, and inspirations will finally come together as a complete album.
Thank you for joining me on the journey.
The countdown continues.
Vertigo arrives October 30.
Pull Quote
“The younger songwriter supplied the original ideas. The older songwriter supplied the perspective.”
Hey there — I’m Jon. This is Moteventure, my corner of the internet where music, movies, lists, and life all collide. Glad you’re here.