Bomshel, “19 and Crazy”
At the intersection of Taylor Swift’s present-tense teenage angst and Kenny Chesney’s trademark “those were the good old days” rememberings of carefree youth, you’ll find the new Bomshel single.
They’re old enough to be looking back on being 19 and crazy, but aren’t quite so old that those days seem completely idyllic. There’s a refreshing perspective here that those days were just stepping stones toward becoming who they are today. While they seem to say that they’d love to be 19 and crazy forever, the fact that they’re already figuring out how to explain that tattoo to their future children suggests that they’re not quite so eager to turn back the hands of time.
The song has an incessant driving beat that straddles the fence between urgency and just plain annoyingly fast. Also, like just about all the B-list singles out there these days, there’s far too much going on in the production. It would be nice to see more producers in Nashville show their confidence in the artist and the song by easing down on the clutter, but you’d have to be 19 and crazy to think that has a chance of happening.