William Beckmann’s soaring and Dierks Bentley’s slumming today.
“Starting Over Again”
William Beckmann
Written by William Beckmann and Harper O’Neill
Jonathan Keefe: The majority of mainstream country’s men have been such marginal singers for multiple generations now– the Chesney – McGraw Effect in action– that it seems that the tide might finally be starting to turn a bit, and hallelujah, y’all. We’ve recently covered up-and-coming acts like Dee White, Kashus Culpepper, Scoot Teasley, and Ty Myers, who are tremendous vocalists, and William Beckmann, who’s been on our radar for a while now, may just have the best vocal tone of them all.
His phrasing and control are a wonder, too, and they elevate “Starting Over Again” from a very good song to one of the best singles of the year to date. The low-key production is polished enough– and is traditional-leaning enough to be on-trend– for the radio without pulling focus from Beckmann’s performance, which is melancholy and lived-in in ways that belie his relative youth. But most of all, there’s the clarity of his vocal tone, a reminder that technical precision and emotional connection don’t have to be mutually exclusive. A
Kevin John Coyne: Right out of the gate, the warm performance and quiet arrangement remind me of early Gordon Lightfoot in the very best way, so this one was bound to hook me quickly.
Beckmann doesn’t mine new lyrical territory here, which makes it all the more impressive that he finds fresh ways of capturing that in between time when you’re not sure you’ll ever love again the way you just did. That flowers line in the bridge is a sucker punch in the very best way.
What an already formidable talent. A
”She Hates Me”
Dierks Bentley
Written by Jimmy Allen, Dierks Bentley, Ross Copperlmann,
Ashley Gorley, Chase McGill, and Wesley Scantlin
KJC: This is a quick crowd-pleasing concert mashup to make millennials feel young again, masquerading as an actual song for some reason.
I never noticed the similarities between Puddle of Mudd’s “She Hates Me” and Dierks Bentley’s “Drunk On a Plane” before this.
The latter was already a much better record, so this entire exercise feels like Bentley’s slumming.
What a waste of a formidable talent. D
JK: The mini-trend of country songs that interpolate other hit songs started off strong enough with Cole Swindell’s “She Had Me At Heads Carolina,” then immediately derailed with Dustin Lynch’s “Chevrolet” and LOCASH’s “Isn’t She Country.” Those latter two singles at least had the relative good sense to desecrate quality material. Dierks Bentley has now brought this trend to what is hopefully its nadir by interpolating a just-godawful Puddle Of Mudd single from the peak of the Butt Rock era.
Bentley has done stupid-on-purpose before– I will still go to bat for “Drunk On A Plane”– and it worked because there was a purposeful, ironic remove to it. This? This just runs a song by store-brand Hoobastank through every gross country stereotype that has taken root since “She Hates Me” was a modern rock hit in 2002.
The only irony Bentley deploys here seems wholly unintentional. He says that the woman he’s singing about, “Knows her [Keith] Whitley / Talkin’ old school every word,” then turns around and wails that, “My music makes her crazy,” while he’s basically covering Puddle of fucking Mudd. Bentley’s usually far better than this, which makes it all the more disappointing that he’s grasping for a radio hit by singing about a woman as a list of personality markers instead of a believable human and then acting like it’s her fault that she doesn’t find him charming. It’s just pathetic enough to be an anthem for the incel brigade. F
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