Midnight
MAC YELLEK FEAT. SAMMIE CARRILLO
Years in Motion
There are some songs that take a weekend to make, and some that take years to find you. Midnight was one of those that waited for the right people, the right timing, and the right story to unfold.
I wrote the first demo at the end of 2020 while on late nights driving between Chicago and Aurora, half-awake, half-dreaming, searching for something that felt calm but still moving me. It sat quietly in my hard drive for years until one night at a party, Sammie and I started talking about music. I told her I had a few ideas lying around, half-finished thoughts really, and asked if she wanted to take a listen. She hit me with, “Yeah, send them through.”
A few days later, she texted me: “Forget the others. I want this one.” That was Midnight.
Finding the Voice
When her first demo came through, I remember stopping mid-scroll and just thinking, “whoa, hold up, what is this?”
Sammie told me later she was nervous to send it. She’d recorded the vocals quietly late at night with her neighbor yelling through the walls, completely raw and unfiltered. “It was scary sending something that vulnerable to someone I didn’t know well,” she said. “But I told myself, worst case, it’s a pass. Best case, it turns into something beautiful.”
What she didn’t know at the time was that I’d already been sitting with that chorus on repeat. The way she sang “Midnight”, the first word of the track, instantly set the scene. It wasn’t just a lyric. It was an invitation. In that one word, she gave the song its pulse.
The rest of the writing came from a shared place of honesty. For Sammie, it started in heartbreak, “I tend to write from places of hurt,” she told me, but over time, it shifted toward healing. For me, it mirrored my own period of reflection. Those drives, those long nights alone with my thoughts. Somewhere in that space between isolation and clarity, Midnight found its meaning.
Building Trust
Working with Sammie felt natural but also raw. We didn’t know each other’s creative language at first, so there was a lot of trial, error, and laughter. We both gave feedback openly, sometimes bluntly and that honesty became the backbone of the song.
There’s a small lyric change in Midnight that I think captures that trust perfectly. Originally, one line said “I crawl back to you.” But one day while listening to late mixes in the car, I realized it didn’t feel right. I called Sammie and said, “Can we change that to, ‘I come back to you’?” It was such a subtle shift, but it completely transformed the emotion, from desperation to grace.
She laughed and said, “Yeah, that’s way better.”
It’s a small example of how we moved. No ego, no walls, just two artists learning how to see through each other’s instincts.
Bringing It to Life
Once the song started feeling complete, we began teasing it at shows before it was even finished. We played Midnight live at The Pony Inn on Belmont and at Mayfest. I still remember Sammie’s first time performing it, she was behind the screen with me, hidden from the crowd. She later said, “At first I was terrified, but then the vocal came on and I was like, nope! I gotta get out there.”
Halfway through, she walked around the screen and owned the room. The crowd couldn’t see it, but I could. It was one of those moments where everything clicked. This wasn’t just a collab anymore; it was something bigger than both of us.
Performing Midnight live before it was done shaped the final mix too. We realized what parts needed space to breathe and where the energy really lived.
The Music Video
When it came time to film the video, we wanted to capture that same feeling of motion, that late-night calm between chaos and clarity. Max Williams directed it, and we kept it intentionally simple: two settings, one car, one night.
We shot both inside and outside the car, with pops of orange and blue light cutting through the dark. Sammie admitted she felt awkward at first: “I kept asking, what do I do with my hands?” But by the time we filmed the chorus scenes, it all flowed naturally.
The car became a metaphor, a moving confessional. The headlights, the reflections, the silence between us, it all echoed what Midnight is about: the quiet moments of self-confrontation that somehow feel freeing.
The Meaning Now
A year later, the song means something different for both of us.
Sammie said it best: “It started in a place of hurt, but it became a song about finding beauty in what’s left. It’s about embracing the good, letting go, and being proud of how far you’ve come.”
For me, Midnight is about trust, not just in another person, but in the creative process itself. Trusting that the song will tell you what it wants to be. Trusting that being vulnerable is the only real way to create something that lasts.
What Comes After?
Midnight taught us patience, collaboration, and the power of letting a song live with you for a while. It’s been over a year since that first demo, and life has shifted. Sammie’s moved to Nashville, I’m evolving my sound in new directions but this song still feels like a timestamp. A small piece of truth we captured in motion.
We made this track independently, without a label or team, just a belief that good music finds its way to people when it’s honest. And now, as Midnight finally steps into the world, I hope it reaches those late-night listeners who need something to drive to, to think to, or to heal to.
Because that’s where Midnight came from. A moment of stillness, a feeling that everything’s changing, and the quiet realization that maybe that’s exactly how it’s supposed to be.
