I'm not sure about your application of "awe" to your subjective experience of this song. The moment you are talking about is the song's temporary shift towards the relative minor. The song is in the key of G major, and at 0:45, the verse begins on an E minor chord, which is a subsitute for G major. I suppose one explanation is that "minor" generally signifies a different emotional state or mood, and that G major and E minor are almost the same chord: that is, they share two notes. So, perhaps it's possible to experience the E minor chord, in this context, in a kind of uncanny relationship to the G major chord--the E minor is a darker cousin. But I think your experience must be contextual: you are hearing something that resonates with you. I hear the song's chord progressions as very traditional, I hear the voice-leading (the movement from chord to chord) as very smooth and a little predictable, I hear an echo of the Beatles, but I don't experience anything like "awe." The experience of goosebumps when hearing music has been examined by David Schwarz, in his book "Listening Subjects," where he discusses the idea of the "sonorous envelop," a primordial experience of sound in which it engages with and permeates our skin barrier--a return to the womb, in effect...hence the goosebumps, as interior and exterior meet. But I am otherwise perplexed by your experience of this moment in the song as somehow "big" or "vast." As a musician/musicologist, I experience "awe" or "vastness" in music in relation to the density of sound, usually; the moments when the texture thickens, and more instruments are playing. Big sound, in other words. Hmm. Interesting.

Alexander Carpenter Thank you very much ! I agree intuitively !I think the goosebumps may come from a feeling of being unexpectedly sustained, or carried physically, by some sort of benevolent if saddening substrate.. This is the message/semantics this shift carries for me and that I also then feel. There is also recognition/ admitting of a sadness/pain in that shift that seems to have been withheld in intellectual rationalisation (which the initial insistent and repetitive theme suggests to me). This admitting of a pain/sadness also feels universal to me.. so there is a feeling of connection with the singer and with humanity.. which may also point to awe.. But I am not sure at all. The goosebumps were really strong also ! But I also hadn't heard the song in years and when I was a teenager I really loved it.

I very much appreciate your enriching comment !