Stewart Taylor knows a thing or two about surviving Los Angeles dating. In his new single and music video, “Dark Summer”, the singer-songwriter, dancer, and model turns a decade of hard lessons into his darkest work yet — and the latest preview of his long-awaited debut album.
The industrial-pop track began with a chat about a bartender’s dark summer nail polish. The idea clicked instantly, and Taylor wrote the song the next day with co-writer Stevie Beerkens of Australian rock band The Faim, drawing on real heartbreak — including the ex who once left him crying behind his sunglasses on a club dance floor.
“I wrote ‘Dark Summer’ about all of the men who have let me down in my life, specifically the ones I’ve dated in LA,” Taylor says. “Dating in Los Angeles has been Hell. It’s definitely not an easy city to find a long-term relationship in.”
It’s not much easier on this side of the country, Stewart.
Sonically, the song marks a sharp turn from Stewart’s previous tracks. What began as a piano ballad — Taylor channeling “a male Lana Del Rey” — evolved into a synth-drenched confessional shaped by Lady Gaga’s Mayhem, Nine Inch Nails, and David Bowie’s “Ashes to Ashes.” A happy accident shaped its sound: backing vocals got bumped to lead once Taylor and Beerkens heard shades of Billy Idol in the mix.
The video is just as theatrical. Co-directed with Benjamin Farren, it casts Taylor as a “walking-dead James Dean” — clad in a red jacket with animatronic angel wings — haunting old Hollywood grounds before a tragic end, a nod to Dean’s own hidden struggles in the industry. Choreographer Julie Vegliante Knight built the zombie-coded dance sequences around Lady Gaga’s Tim Burton-directed “Dead Dance,” while Emmy-nominated makeup artist Kályd Odeh crafted the horror-movie look. Taylor credits dancing drenched in fake blood in Justin Timberlake’s “No Angels” video with pushing him toward darker territory.
“Dark Summer” continues the rollout of Taylor’s twelve-song debut album, a genre-blurring project he calls his “magnum opus” — a long way from 2019’s “Mess Your Hair Up” and 2024’s “Even“. “I have so many layers as a person and as an artist,” Taylor says, “and ‘Dark Summer’ really explores and embraces my dark side.”
An outspoken member of the LGBTQ+ community whose coming-out story appears in the bestselling book It Gets Better, Taylor hopes the song resonates beyond his own history. “I hope listeners tap into their own inner Billy Idol when they hear ‘Dark Summer,’” he says.
Follow Stewart Taylor on Instagram and TikTok @imstewarttaylor.
