The Meaning Behind Benson Boone's "Vulnerable" Megahit Song "Beautiful Things"
The May 3 SNL Musical Guest described his globally-beloved track as a "song that's really personal" to him.
From auditioning on American Idol to backflipping at the Grammys in a sparkly pantsuit, Benson Boone's career has been a wild ride so far. The 22-year-old musician from Washington catapulted to the spotlight after the release of his smash hit “Beautiful Things,” and the song has taken on a life of its own ever since.
Not only has “Beautiful Things” been all over TikTok for the past year, Billboard declared it “the biggest song in the world” after it rose to the top of the music charts in 2024. In his relatively short time as a famous musician, Boone has been nominated for a handful of awards, including a Grammy nomination for Best New Artist, performed at Coachella, and made his debut as a Saturday Night Live Musical Guest on May 3.
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“Beautiful Things” remains at the top of Billboard charts — read on to learn all about the meaning of the song that solidified Boone as a global sensation.
What are the lyrics to Benson Boone's "Beautiful Things" about?
Released in 2024 on Boone’s Fireworks & Rollerblades album, “Beautiful Things” is an emotional love song. The lyrics emphasize his gratitude for finding someone special — “a girl my parents love,” as he sings in the first verse — but also the desperation and fear he feels about potentially losing something so precious.
As he sings in the powerful and emotion-packed chorus: “Please stay / I want you, I need you, oh God / Don't take / These beautiful things that I've got.”
“The theme of the song is just begging someone to stay. It’s needing something so badly that you’re just terrified to lose it,” Boone shared with Genius about the meaning of “Beautiful Things.”
"If someone just doesn't love you the person you are, there's not much you can do about that. And so a lot is just out of my control and I have to be okay with that," he continued. "Being rejected by this person would really, actually, really suck. That would be the worst feeling and that's, in the song, what I'm terrified of — being one of the rejects, man."
Boone also explained to Genius that the drastic switch-up in the song's tempo and style from the first verse to the chorus is meant to reflect his mindset. "The verse is explaining, 'You have such a good thing and you've been given this incredible thing in life, this relationship that's beautiful and you love,'" he said. "But then right when you switch to the chorus, it's like, 'Hot damn, I could lose this all.'"
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Benson Boone's "Beautiful Things" was inspired by a relationship he was “terrified” to lose
In a February 2024 interview with Billboard, Boone explained that a fairly new relationship had inspired him to write “Beautiful Things” shortly after moving to Los Angeles.
“It was inspired by a relationship that I had just gotten into,” he told the outlet. “For the first time in my life, I felt like I was extremely out of control of the way this relationship would turn out. Meaning like, in the past, I feel like I’ve always known that I could be the one to end a relationship. This one felt very different. It was the first time that I’d really been actually, genuinely terrified to lose something.”
Boone shared with Billboard that he wrote the song on his grandmother’s old piano. “I couldn’t sleep one night, and I didn’t know what to do, so I came downstairs and started playing the piano,” he said. “That’s when I wrote the melodies for ‘Beautiful Things.’ The next day I had a session, and I took it into the studio."
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Benson Boone described "Beautiful Things" as “very vulnerable”
The lyrics to “Beautiful Things” provide a glimpse into the raw emotions that went into this ballad. As Boone sings in the opening verse: “And I thank God every day / For the girl He sent my way / But I know the things He gives me, He can take away / And I hold you every night / And that's a feeling I wanna get used to / But there's no man as terrified as the man who stands to lose you.”
In an interview with 102.7 KIIS FM, Boone said his smash hit is “very vulnerable.”
“A trait that I’ve kind of always had is I’m very comfortable in being vulnerable,” he said. “I think as someone who releases music to the world, not knowing how they’re gonna take it, I think there’s really much I can do about how other people take my lyrics and how they express themselves with my music. But ‘Beautiful Things’ is very vulnerable, it’s definitely like a song that’s really personal to me.”
Boone added that he understands everyone appreciates music differently, and some may not interpret his song as he does. “Some people just wanna scream it, and some people actually listen to the lyrics and it means something to them in their life,” he said, adding that he loves songs that allow people to “have their own story” with it. “That’s kind of what it’s meant to do.”
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Benson Boone is SNL's May 3 Musical Guest
On May 3, Boone marked another major career milestone as he made his Musical Guest debut on Saturday Night Live, with Abbott Elementary star and creator Quinta Brunson as the night’s Host.
