Even with “The First Time” still climbing the charts and playing everywhere on radio and TV, Lifehouse is readying the second single from the band’s latest album “Who We Are.”  While the aforementioned first single was an upbeat track, the new single ‘Broken,’ couldn’t be further from the opposite, and as lead singer Jason Wade explained to Alternative Addiction, it’s one of the most personal songs on the record.

“Broken is the song that moves me the most.  I wrote it in Nashville, about 6 months ago,” Wade explained.  “I was in my hotel room at 3 AM, I was out there visiting a friend…he’s really sick, he needs a kidney transplant.”

The friend that Wade speaks of is an artist as well and actually helped Wade write the track “Sick Cycle Carousel” on the band’s debut album.

“He has to do this dialysis machine for nine hours a day, and just to see my friend in that place was really overwhelming for me.  I went back to the hotel room, and couldn’t sleep,” Wade said.

While sitting in his hotel room late that night, Wade was compelled to write “Broken.” 

Incredibly charged with emotion from his ailing friend, Wade wrote the song in just 15 minutes on a hotel pad of paper.

“That song just kinda fell in my lap, and I really haven’t written a song like that since ‘Hanging by a Moment’ where it just happened within a 15 minute time period.”

“Broken” was also the last song that Wade wrote for the album, but he feels that writing it could be a definitive instant in songwriting career.

“I feel like those moments of inspiration, when you look back on them, really define you as an artist.”

First Listen: "Broken" by Lifehouse