Willie Nelson’s new single is this week’s consensus pick.
“High Life”
SACHA
Written by Emma-Lee Dory, Chris Loocke, Jaden Michaels, and Sacha Visagie
Jonathan Keefe: It’s been a minute– too long, really– since we checked in on SACHA, yet another black woman who should’ve been a mainstream star many times over by now. “High Life” further builds that case: It’s a perfectly constructed pop-country single that makes for a celebratory escapist listen.
The last few years have seen fewer of the kind of casual drug references that are central to “High Life” on actual hit records: Throughout the twenty-teens, it seemed like every other song was built on an addiction metaphor. So the concept of “High Life” is at least a little bit dated, though SACHA focuses more on the feeling of a high itself: “Whatever floats your boat / Whatever gets you off,” and all that.
It’s SACHA’s enthusiasm as a performer that makes the record work. She’s singing about living the high life and actually sounds like that’s true. She still sounds a lot like Jo Dee Messina to my ears, and this is certainly of a piece with the brand of uptempo, affirming songs that Messina did best. B+
Kevin John Coyne: As Jonathan noted above, this theme has been done quite a bit over recent years, and really throughout the history of country music, if you lump marijuana in with alcohol.
The record sounds like a European dance mix of a Come On Over single, but it still sounds fresh because of SACHA’s vocal performance. What jumped out at me most was her reading of the line, “Baby, you do you and I’ll do I.”
I flashed back instantly to Montgomery Gentry’s “You Do Your Thing” and Kacey Musgraves’ “Follow Your Arrow,” both of which had a defiance that suggested the priority was protecting their own freedom to be themselves against those who would take that right away from them.
SACHA delivers the same message as an invitation. She doesn’t just want you to do your thing and follow your arrow, so long as you let her do the same. She’s saying, “Come on over and be your true self over here and I’ll do the same. I’m building a world big enough to wrap its arms around all of us.”
I like that message. A
“Gonna Love You”
Parmalee
Written by Abram Dean, David Fanning, Andy Sheridan, and Matt Thomas
KJC: In the early days of Country Universe, there was a year where my favorite single was Keith Urban’s “I Told You So.”
I was still doing the year-end lists by myself back then. I made a conscious decision to not list Urban’s single as my top single of the year because I thought it didn’t have enough gravitas to be a “top single of the year.” So I went with another single I loved: Tim McGraw’s “If You’re Reading This.” It was an easy decision to justify at the time, but it wasn’t the truth.
Since then, I’ve tried to approach each record with fresh ears, regardless of my impressions of the artist, if any, or its place on the Country Universe spectrum. When I have a genuine reaction to something, I share it, even if it might compromise my credibility with some readers.
So here’s what happened. I picked “Gonna Love You” as one of the two songs to be featured this week because it’s in the top twenty at country radio and I think it’s important that we stay a part of that conversation, even if most of what we like at Country Universe won’t come within a thousand miles of terrestrial country radio.
My mind was drifting off as I looked out the window during my morning commute, and the lead vocal of this track grabbed me with its raw emotion and vulnerability. I was genuinely moved.
Upon repeated listens, I can hear how the track is constructed from elements that I love from other country and pop records, especially those that straddle the genres. How appropriate that this is because it reminds me of Urban at his most raw and vulnerable (“The Luxury of Knowing, “Thank You.”)
It’s not the “my soul just left my body” sense of discovery that I felt hearing Tami Neilson for the first time, or the slow burn revelation that Kane Brown is my favorite artist to come along since the turn of the century. But it’s good enough to my ears to want to hear more from a band that I’ve only known by name for however long they’ve already been around. B+
JK: Were I not looking directly at the cover art for this single, I’d have sworn it was one of the ballads from Backstreet Boys’ Millennium or 98 Degrees’ … And Rising that was too mid to get released as a single in 2001. And I’m not the flavor of poptimist critic who means that as a compliment. This band is so utterly anonymous. F
“Last Leaf”
Willie Nelson
Written by Kathleen Brennan and Tom Waits
JK: My God. An absolutely brutal record that plays so much as strict autobiography that it’s hard to believe Nelson didn’t actually write it. He’s never put his aged voice to better or more devastating use than on this somber– but beautiful– song that reckons not only with his own mortality but with the mortality of all of the other leaves taken by the autumn. A
KJC: I live in a beach community that my father’s side of the family moved to when he was a teenager. At the time, it was a working class neighborhood of mostly public service workers and a reasonably affordable place for a big family to settle down.
And what a big family it was back then. I was one of the youngest of my generation, which was produced by the four children of my paternal grandmother, who herself was one of eight children and countless cousins.
By 2009, all but one of those eight children were dead, including my grandmother. Of her own four children, three were dead, including my father.
Only one person was still alive: my great aunt. One day I was walking on the boardwalk when I happened to pass her sitting on the bench, staring out at the water. She was alone. There was no one left from her generation and far too many gone from the one that came after.
That image of her sitting by herself came flooding back to me when I heard “Last Leaf,” a song that captures the unique, isolating loneliness of being the last one standing. We spend all of our lives fighting against our own mortality. We can’t win that fight, and when you last longer in the ring than all of your loved ones, being left completely alone is your prize.
I’m so thankful that this song exists, even if I’ve got to be in a safe place to listen to it. A
“Sounds Like the Radio”
Zach Top
Written by Carson Chamberlain, Wyatt McCubbin, and Zach Top
KJC: 1994 was a pinnacle year for country music, as we captured so well when we did our Best of 1994 feature ten years ago.
“Sounds Like the Radio” isn’t the first radio hit to try to capture 1994 in a song, and let me say first that this is light years better than the Jason Aldean monstrosity from a few years back.
But it’s still underwhelming to me, and that’s because it sounds a little too much like the radio in 1994.
If this song was sent to radio back then, it would’ve been correctly dismissed as the latest “throw it at the wall and see if it sticks” attempt to break another hat act. I’d be annoyed that I had to get through “Sounds Like the Radio” and “If Bubba Can Dance (I Can Too)” so I could hear “Spilled Perfume” and “What a Crying Shame.” By the time the bridge ripped off Daryle Singletary and Joe Diffie in one line, I was jonesing for 1994 era CMT, when I could hear Emmylou Harris and Johnny Cash next to Dwight Yoakam and Patty Loveless, and be spared some of the radio hits that mercifully didn’t have music videos.
Now in 2024, “Sounds Like the Radio” is warmly nostalgic and tugs at the feels. I have so much affection for that era that I can look back at its greatest excesses with a smile, and I appreciate that Top has so much love for that sound, too. I’m sure I’ll enjoy songs of his that are less meta than this one. There’s just too much truly great music from 1994, and so much new music now that can stand toe to toe with that year’s best, that I’m not really interested in nostalgia for its own sake. C
JK: Of the 90s Hat Act acolytes who’ve made inroads this year, Zach Top has had the most successful incursion into the mainstream. I’m not particularly mad about that, either. I think the references he makes here are more clever than not, and he actually backs it up with his overall aesthetic. This single does sound like something we’d have gone to bato bat for back in ‘94, y’know?
In terms of why this was the lead single, there’s something to be said for country radio’s tendency to be slow on the uptake. So if this is a little too, “In this essay, I will..,” as a thesis statement, it does make sense that he and his team have pushed this into the 20s of the airplay chart. But it’s also worth noting that “I Never Lie,” which is even better, is currently having a viral moment and would make a stronger impact in terms of what Top can really do.
He’s got the goods, for sure, like many of the artists whose style he’s paying tribute to. As a standalone single, though, this one’s maybe just a little too on-the-nose. B+
I couldn’t help but laugh at the disparity in your takes on the Parmalee song. I’m with Jonathan on that one.
I said to Jonathan this morning that the Parmalee record is that tiny sliver of our musical tastes Venn Diagram that doesn’t overlap!
I too found the contrast of takes on the Parmalee song interesting. I figured a Parmalee song with David Fanning as a co-writer would have gotten a uniformly bad review!
I concur on ”Sounds Like the Radio.” The sound is on point but the lyrical theme just falls flat. Really glad I didn’t judge the album on that one song, because the rest of the album is well worth repeated listens. My favorite song from it is ”I Never Lie.”
I agree that the Zach Top song is certainly not his strongest, but if it’s what helps others discover I Never Lie or Use Me, so be it. A critical element of his appeal is that he is an excellent guitar player, probably shaped by his bluegrass background. And in an era where poor singers (Moroney, Bryan, etc.) seem to be stealing the show, it would be nice to have another country star who is actually a strong vocalist.
And yes, the gap in ratings on the Parmalee song got a great chuckle out of me.
…parmalee’s “gonna love you” starts kinda like chicago’s “hard to say i’m sorry”. guess, it just happens in the ai era and one doesn’t have to worry that generation tiktok would remember/know the latter anyway or come across that clip. after going from boyfriend to wedding country to defibrillator country now, what drama will they take their inspiration from next? can wait to see that, i feel.
…i prefer sacha’s “high life” even without chewbacca’s grandson guest starring in the clip over christina carpenter’s decaf “espresso”.
…so ott this one from zach top. you’d almost expect to see him on “south park” soon – or the opry.
…willie ain’t lyin’ there. what a creative spirit this man is.
Now I’m wishing I hadn’t edited some of the sharper lines that would’ve made the Controversy! even more striking out of my Parmalee review!
Nice to see the consensus around Top’s “I Never Lie.” My gut is that his team is likely savvy enough to recognize that they should pull “… Radio” from radio and pivot to that one, which is really taking off on streaming. Would be the right call, for sure.
Agreed that “Gonna Love You” basically rips off Chicago’s “Hard to Say I’m Sorry” in the verses. It’s the best song I’ve heard from Parmalee but that’s such an incredibly low bar.