The 80′s keyboard is like a cheese grater grating extra cheese onto the pizza that is “You Look So Good in Love.” To the modern ear, it imbues the song with an unintentional levity even before George gets to his third-verse recitation. Throw in the über-earnest chorus – not to mention the video – and the thing becomes just about impossible to take seriously.
And yet – screw you, who doesn’t love “You Look So Good in Love”? It’s one of those rare records you can sort of enjoy ironically and unironically at the same time, as the wimpy, dated production collides with Strait’s rich croon and one of the most singable melodies he’s ever found. Will it make anyone’s all-time list? No. Has every country fan over 25 sung the chorus to a shower head or steering wheel? “It’s easyyy to see.”
Written by Glen Ballard, Rory Michael Bourke and Kerry Chater
The closest he’s come in two albums to capturing his old uptempo spark. Maybe that’s because he’s found his banjo again, and it pokes some much-needed holes in the thick layer of polish. Or maybe it’s because he dares to be a little lusty – “waiting on the sun to go down,” with his passion rising like (nice touch) a lake in heat.
Either way, it works, if in a disposable way. It could even function as a prequel to the melancholy “‘Til Summer Comes Around.” But Urban’s so revved up here that you hope not.
That’s “don’t rock the jukebox” as in “I’m brokenhearted and that darn rock music won’t help. Play George Jones.” And the pun is that it sounds like he’s asking you not to jostle the machine. Which…people don’t commonly do, really. Kind of a stretch, right?
But it’s a record that defies explanation. Because Jackson perfectly inhabits the song’s affable weariness, and because Scott Hendricks and Keith Stegall arrange it to honky-tonk heaven. You end up believing that some boozed-up guy actually could be making this request – if, perhaps, mentally – and couching his hurt in a quirky half-joke, the way people often do when they’re first emerging from a lonely spell.
In sum, it’s like hearing a sunnier, contemporary Johnny Paycheck. Little surprise, then, that this odd duck took Jackson’s career to its rightful next level.
Written by Alan Jackson, Roger Murrah and Keith Stegall
Give Lambert her usual credit for adventurousness: the production on this kiss-off number is rustic and snappy, like some lost 70′s folk-rock nugget. And “Baggage Claim” is an artist’s work, not an assembly-line knock-off; we certainly haven’t heard this central metaphor before.
But it’s not a clever enough metaphor to deliver the good dis it means to, nor is it silly enough to earn points for camp. It’s just kind of…lame.
Throw in a pinched vocal, and the thing just sounds like a throwaway ditty that no one was clear-eyed enough to throw away.
It’s fun to imagine the looks on the radio DJs’ faces when they got this one in the mail. That pretty, weird-named lady whose records they’d brushed aside before, now looking all bizarro-sexy in a red “executive jumpsuit” thing on the cover, and with that song title.
It was a smart introduction to the Shania-Mutt Lange machine, in retrospect. “Whose Bed Have Your Boots Been Under?” has all the sugary hooks and goofy feminist pluck that would come to define the singer and producer’s joint legacy, but it still sounds more or less like a “normal” country song, an easy little addition to the mid-nineties radio format. Who’d have guessed that as soon the pair got their foot in the door, they’d take over the whole building?
Written by Robert John “Mutt” Lange and Shania Twain
Written by Casey Beathard, Monty Criswell and Ed Hill
Wish this weren’t quite so heavy-handed about driving home the theme; a subtler approach could have made it a Strait-type classic. Still a nice, fresh idea, though.
Grade: B
Jason Aldean featuring Ludacris, “Dirt Road Anthem (Remix)” (Listen)
Written by Colt Ford and Brantley Gilbert
The jauntier rapping and production on Ludacris’ verse brings the track to life. They should have let him take over and just given Jason the choruses, a la Nelly/Tim’s “Over and Over.”
Written by Ryan Fleener, Jeff Middleton and Justin Wilson
Their Springsteen is showing too much, but I still hope it’s a hit. Like “Something Better” before it, solid blue-collar bar rock.
Grade: B+
Old Crow Medicine Show, “Wagon Wheel”
Written by Bob Dylan and Ketch Secor
I’m confused. Are they actually releasing this oldie as a single? Wasn’t it already one? This is probably just some random promo thingy. In any case, still one of country music’s all-time great sing-alongs.
My friends all think I’m a big wimp. They’re right. But I do like Wayne. (Though even in this case, I’m drawn to the vulnerability in the song more than the aggression.)
This shouldn’t come as a surprise to most of my friends in real life, but those in the blogosphere probably wouldn’t expect me to love 50 Cent as much as I do. I could list a handful of songs here, but this one is a blast.
What can I say? I like to think I have a strong overview-type knowledge of country music, but I guess everyone’s got some inexplicable holes in their cultural patchwork. I’ve known of this classic by name for years and have listened through a fair amount of other Don Williams, but I’d never actually bothered to fire the song up until Leeann used it as her pick for one of these categories the other day. Good stuff, though.
This song was released months ago, but I just heard it for the first time on the radio the other week. There’s something about it – between the 90s-esque melody and the adorably written storyline – that totally hits my sweet spot.
Well, as indicated by their respective titles, her first album was recorded when she was 19 and her second album was released very recently at age 21, so it’s taken roughly 2 years for me to discover Adele, even though the rest of you have known about her for a while by now. Since I don’t live under a rock, I’ve of course heard her name, just not her music.
A couple yearning to rekindle the fire in their relationship? Classic country. One asking the other if he/she remembers the old passion and the other chiming in “remind me”? That’s pretty good, too – and genuinely sexy in a way neither Brad Paisley nor Carrie Underwood has ever been on record. There’s no doubt that this single was loaded with potential.
So why doesn’t it feel like the big event it should be?
Mostly because it’s trying too hard to be a big event. Paisley crowds out “Remind Me” with guitar licks and drums, and he and Underwood wail up a storm as it progresses, both sounding technically better than ever but obliterating the song’s smoldering sensuality. They’ve mistaken an “I Need You” for a “Don’t You Wanna Stay.”
There are a few of your typical too-cute Paisley details as well, like an underwhelming second-verse story and the use of “made out” in a song that doesn’t warrant such lyrical smirks.
The core components are still appealing enough, mind. But a little revision – and re-envisioning – might have made the difference between a pleasant summer hit and a career moment.
1983 | Peak: #1
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