CHOI YU REE’s seven-track EP Stay: Two is a companion piece to last year's Stay: One, but it doesn't continue that album's story so much as reverse it. Where Stay: One moved from the ground toward the sky, tracing a season of lingering moments and expansion, Stay: Two moves the opposite way: outward hope collapsing inward, ease giving way to solitude, until the record ends alone in a room with nothing but a voice.

CHOI YU REE has described Stay: Two as an album without a grand story, built instead from emotions gathered along the way. "Higher" opens by lifting a lyric and a hidden instrumental cue straight from "Journey to the Sun" – Stay: One's closing track – carrying its grandeur forward before the album starts pulling it apart. "Wildflower," a track she seriously considered as the title cut, answers "Falling" from the same album, repeating its plea to be seen with an entirely different weight behind it. Even "Drift," written last and intentionally imperfect in its instrumentation, sat uneasily with her during production, given it’s a song about motion on an album meant to be about staying.

That push-pull between staying and drifting runs through everything here. "Last Love," the title track, was recorded rough on purpose, because CHOI YU REE felt the song could only ring true if it stayed unfinished, the same way she's said she still doesn't know exactly what love is. By "At My Worst," the ease promised early in the record has curdled into collapse. And "Monologue" closes it out the way it began, a cappella, alone, on the idea that solitude might be where she's most honest.

The last track of <Stay: One> is a song titled "Journey to the Sun" which has a very grand sound. In the track "Higher," I wanted to naturally carry over that same sound. There's lyrics in "Higher" that goes, "I've been to the sun once, I have nothing to fear," which is a reference that connects back to "Journey to the Sun". I also hid an easter egg in the instrumental line of the track. So overall, this song has quite a few points that connect to "Journey to the Sun".

This song best mirrors the current mindset that I have. I hoped that, after taking such a powerful leap forward, the emotion waiting on the other side would be this sense of ease. So as I was working on this track, I was anticipating what new emotions I might feel after that sort of ease. The chorus layers are quite heavy, too; stacking various intricate harmonies in multiple layers made the working process a lot of fun.

I hoped that people would take a moment to look at even the smallest parts of life with a sense of ease. That's actually why I seriously considered choosing this as the title track. In the chorus, there are lyrics like, "See me for who I am," and, "Look at me," which is also a reference that connects to "Falling" from my previous album, <Stay: One>.

I can't quite define what love is, but this is a song that's undeniably about love. In the end, the song comes to a close without ever arriving at an answer, and it doesn't try to force one either. I deliberately recorded the instrumentation so it would sound a little rough around the edges. I felt that the song could only be complete if every part of it retained a sense of imperfection. I also recall recording it with a guitar that only cost around $100.

This is the very last song I wrote. I thought it was a track absolutely necessary to transition to the next song. Although "Drift" is accompanied by beautiful instrumentation, it is a song that most clearly portrays an emotional descent through its lyrics. I was a little worried that, unlike the rest of the album, this song might feel too directional rather than embodying the idea of staying, and end up feeling out of place. Thankfully, it blended in much more naturally than I expected.

"At my worst" is a song that captures that state of being completely crumbled down, with zero embellishment. In Track 3, "Wildflower," there is also a lyric that says, "Please hold me," but the emotion behind those words are very different here. This song captures the feeling of being on the verge of falling apart—or even if you don't, of already having hit rock bottom, with nowhere left to fall. If I ever perform this song live in concert, I think I'll have to brace myself not to cry.

In the end, this is the song that concludes in the loneliest and most empty way. As the lyrics suggest, it captures my tendency to search for meaning even in the most desolate moments—when I'm left completely alone, facing nothing but emptiness. More than any other track, I think this song embodies what I wanted to express throughout the Stay series. At its core, it's about this realization: "I'm at my weakest when I'm alone, but perhaps that's also when I'm at my most honest." True to its title, "Monologue" begins a cappella and ends the same way. As for what lingers after the song fades out, I'd like to leave that with the listener.