“Take Your Time”
Sam Hunt
Written by Sam Hunt, Shane McAnally, and Josh Osborne
“Take Your Time” is interesting for its combination of rapidly delivered spoken word and warmly sung melody, and for its tentative attempts to acknowledge a woman’s own agency.
The structure borrows heavily from contemporary urban music, and will sound familiar to anyone who has listened to a fair amount of Drake. But Hunt keeps the proceedings grounded enough in country that it doesn’t sound nearly as reductive as it could’ve been.
Of course, the song doesn’t quite go far enough to move from interesting to truly compelling. The sung chorus doesn’t live up to the spoken verses, and his claims to have a genuine interest in not wasting the lady’s time seem a lot less noble when he later makes it clear that he’s not interested in anything else about her, including what she’s doing tomorrow and after.
“Take Your Time” is like “Dirt Road Anthem” was when it was released, a record that squanders all its creativity on the structure and leaves out the substance necessary for it to remain worth listening to once the novelty wears off.
Grade: C
What……………. I’m stunned this is an F. I’m just shocked by this grade entirely. I’m gonna explain. My gosh spoken word verses should never be in country music. I didn’t mind Maddie & Tae doing it at the end of Girl In A Country Song cause it’s just for a brief moment but this he keeps doing it over and over again. The lyrics really piss me off it’s him picking up a girl for a one-night stand essentially. Real charming. The production has nothing country and it’s in generally dull and uninteresting. Sam in his delivery comes off as arrogant and manipulative to me. This is one of the worse songs I’ve ever heard. Well that rant aside this guy in my opinion is an insult to country music. I hope he can switch over to pop where he belongs. The funny thing is this wasn’t the worse song on his godawful album.
I hate this song there’s only a couple songs on the chart that are worse Sun Daze and maybe Homegrown Honey but besides that this song sucks.
I really wouldn’t go so far as to say spoken word has no place in country music, seeing as how the “recitation” style has an important historical place in the genre and is something that a whole lot of great artists have done very, very well.
But I don’t think there’s any evidence that Hunt or many of his contemporaries– Chase Rice, Florida-Georgia Line, Thomas Rhett, et al– have a knowledge or appreciation of the genre that extends back any farther than “Over and Over,” Tim McGraw’s duet with Nelly. The comparison to Drake is one that has been applied often to Hunt, and it’s as on-point as any; Hunt’s half-singing may be better than what Rice does, but that’s an awfully low bar to clear.
My only problem with this song, is that it’s marketed as a country song, and really, I don’t think it’s anywhere close. It is a strong recording though, and I do think Hunt as a lot of talent, but please country music.
As a general record, I’d give this a B+. As a country record, D.
Raymond,
Whoa! Spoken word has historically been a big part of country music, so there’s definitely a place for it in the genre. But with that aside, I agree with Jonathan that the spirit that this song is done in probably isn’t taking that part of country music into account, since it makes no sense for Hunt to be marketed as a country artist in the first place.
Leeann,
Sorry about that but my country knowledge isn’t as wide I maintain that this guy should not be in country but pop rapping music. Besides in his spoken word verses I still think he comes off really arrogant.
The first time I heard this song, I reluctantly liked it, and tried my best to defend it as not only a strong song, but also a genuine country song.
But the more I hear, the more uncomfortable I get with it. Not only does it sound less and less country to me, but it also sounds more and more manipulative. Since Hunt also has songs like “Single For The Summer” and “Ex To See” in his catalogue, I have a hard time buying him as the shy, sincere guy mustering his courage to talk to a girl.
We’ll have to see what I think of it by the end of its run, but it’s definitely on shaky ground with me now.
This & Leave the Night on are both some of the best songs on country radio, & an insult to it.
Hunt writes & sings very solid pop music. I enjoy it much more than most of the garbage currently being released on the radio, & I always turn the volume up when one of his songs comes on.
That said…he really shouldn’t be on country radio at all.
It’s an interesting conundrum.
I recently drove from Florida to Indiana, and subsequently, listened to the radio a lot during those 16 hours. This song came on 7-8 times, and I never once made it past the first chorus. Just not my style, I suppose, but it most certainly doesn’t deserve a slot on a “country” music station.
Yeah, I do enjoy a lot of pop (although I prefer country and hip hop), so I’m probably not the person to ask whether this should be on country radio.
Better than I expected.
I’m not against spoken verses. I still love the old Ink Spots songs from the 40’s with their spoken part in the middle, songs like “We Three”, “If I Didn’t Care”, “I Don’t Want to Set the World on Fire”, “Do I Worry”, “Maybe”, etc.
I have no use for this artist at all. I’m a huge Keith Urban fan and after Keith performed COP CAR on the Grammy’s, Sam Hunt went on a twitter rant about CC being stolen from him even though there were two other writers for the song. He acts like a spoiled jerk IMO. Don’t know all the details but his tweets were mean. Can’t imagine Keith and his people being song stealers. I believe because of this that CC would have gone higher on the charts but seemed as though it was pulled. Then it was nominated for a Grammy. Looks like Sam Hunt would have been happy instead of jealous. JMO.
I mean, I don’t let the fact that he tore Dierks a new one for stealing the chord progression from Razor Town for Home stop me from enjoying Jason Isbell.
Although, there is obviously a bit of a quality gap between Hunt & Isbell, even when you account for the genre difference (that is, Isbell makes better country than Hunt does Adult Contemporary Pop).
Personally, I don’t buy that this song is:
A) sincere
B) country
C) a sincere attempt at country.
I find the lyrics and attitude smarmy, and the music tepid.
I would call this mediocre AC Pop / R’n’B.
In short, I don’t care for it.
I have to agree with Thomas and Markus. I like the song. In fact, it’s one of my favorite songs on the charts right now. The problem is that it’s not country, and I have a pretty loose definition of country. Thanks to Kevin though for giving it a fair review and not an automatic F due to it’s production.
Gloria,
I’m not into Sam Hunt at all, but why would he be happy about the Grammy nomination for a song that he didn’t get credit on if he felt that the song had been stolen from him? I’m not understanding the logic.
As Thomas said, Jason Isbell went on a similar rant about Dierks Bently, but “Home” did well anyway. I’m guessing “Cop Car” didn’t do well, because it wasn’t a good song. I hope that’s the reason anyway.
As for the Hunt song, I don’t like it on any level, whether it’s country, pretend country or just plain pop.