Chart Position on Hot 100 at time of writing: 68 (Peak Position: 40)
Country Chart Position at time of writing: 17 (Peak: 2)
Video Link: How did all these fish get into this barrel?
Review: Let's be honest, if you actually enjoy listening to Florida Georgia Line you just shouldn't read this review. I'll be besmirching a band you like while using words like "besmirching" and "cacophony," which will just make you madder when you have to go get a dictionary to decipher my sesquipedalian dismantling of your loathsome Lothario duo.
Are they gone? Nifty.
Look, this is low-hanging fruit and I know it. But I'm coming off a stressful week spent in a town where people unironically think this music is representative of the lives they live. That's not true, but it's hard to write songs about chugging Budweiser at 11am because your meth guy doesn't start selling until noon, so they settle for this.
Sorry for the long intro...lyrics!
Girl you melt me like ice in whiskey
Or like ice in any other room temperature liquid. But whiskey rhymes easily with "me," and it fits in with the bro-douche-country leitmotif that life is all about sleeping with pretty girls, driving trucks, and getting hammered. So the songwriters used whiskey.
with those blue flame looks that you give me.
What the heck is a "blue flame look"?! To see if anyone in the history of humanity has used this terminology before, I Googled it. The first result is from the Department of Physics at the University of Illinois. The second result is for a propane company.
Therefore, we must conclude that the line "blue flame look" is another example of Big Energy's pervasive hold upon our society, and that I have no friends because I am looking up the lyrics to country music songs on a beautiful summer day.
You can't hide,
what's inside
Scenarios in which it is OK to say "You can't hide what's inside:"
1. If you are a motivational speaker, encouraging a group of small children to be themselves
2. If you are manipulating someone to do something against their will.
3. If you are a murderer and you are about to murder someone.
Scenarios in which it is not OK to say "You can't hide what's inside:"
1. When singing a painfully generic bro-country song.
2. Any other time ever.
And it's killin' me right now to see
You wanna slip off with me again.
Oh, good, a line about how she knows she wants him. "Blurred Lines," anyone?
Look, I get that lots of people (male and female) find confidence attractive. I also get that there's a fine line between confidence and cockiness. But this is so far over that line that the line is a faint memory. If the confidence/cockiness line is the Florida/Georgia state line, then this section of lyrics would be located somewhere in Kentucky. Also, the chorus is starting. Yay.
Why should we go round and round the truth, like we been doin'
You're right. I've sidestepped a major issue for too long in this review. But no more. Let's speak the truth--my intense research confirms that Florida Georgia Line singer Tyler Hubbard is in fact former Creed front man Scott Stapp:
Special thanks to my former roommate Dave for pointing this out. Further thanks to the photographer of the bottom photo who apparently told Mr. Hubbard, "Now act like you're about to ask a girl if she's 18 yet."
Every time we lie girl, we're losin'.
Seriously, this is classical manipulative behavior. "I see you want me," "Don't deny it," and so on. This thing should be used by psychiatrists to spot potential criminals.
So why should we spend Saturday night alone
"Not with you" does not mean "alone." Do not confuse the two.
When I can call you on the phone, pick you up
Hold it. Near as I can tell, this song is being delivered to the lovely lady in question, right? And yet, here we have the words "call you on the phone" in the midst of the song. So...is he texting this proposition to her? Is this a sing-along email? Is our singer doing that thing where you're talking on the phone and you ask "Where's my phone?" and then you realize that it's in your hand?
Make it up as we go along
Risky to put your songwriting strategy in the middle of your chorus, but you have to admire the guts it took to do it.
Pull an all nighter chasin' that desire
In college, I once pulled an all nighter writing a paper about the German Navy in the First World War as a social barometer for the country as a whole. I got a B on it. That has nothing to do with the song, I've just waited 10 years to tell someone about it and I finally had my opening. God, that felt good.
What were we talking about again? Oh, right, a generic 2015 country tune that would fit right in to those montages of 6 or 7 songs with the same tune and lyrics. If you haven't looked one of those up, you really should. It will be much more entertaining than this post or (heaven forbid) listening to the rest of the song.
Sparks flying in her eyes like lighters
Even atrocious songs have 1 or 2 passable lines in them. This is the one for this song, even if the sentence structure makes it sound like there are sparks flying into this poor girl's eyes, which would probably blind her. Which would actually make sense, what with the fact that she's hanging out with Florida Georgia Line.
Get a little higher
Actually, get much higher. Go into that register that only dogs can hear. Those furry jerks have had it too easy for too long--they deserve to suffer through Florida Georgia Line as much as the rest of us.
Sippin' on fire
You know, the only flame references in the song thus far have been to the lovely lady's eyes. Thus, we can conclude that this is a song about ocular cannibalism.
OK, that's taking the line too far. It's probably just a reference to Fireball Whiskey, which is also referenced in a different Florida Georgia Line song. That song is different than this one, though. In that song, the singer is an overconfident jerk who is drinking with a woman and is pretty sure she wants to sleep with him. Totally different. Verse two of the song will show us just how different:
Yeah you act like you don't know what you're missin'
The self-confidence dripping off of these lines is incredible. We all know that guy who thought that every woman he met (waitress, bartender, parole officer, etc.) secretly wanted him. Apparently that guy grew up and became a songwriter.
Every time you end up back with him.
Cause it's safe.
...wait a motherfletching second.
We're 1 minute and 30 seconds into this song. Thus far, we know that you've had multiple liaisons with this young lady, none of which have ended in a committed relationship. We've put up with a minute of cacophonous over-produced noise that basically amounts to a nonsensical sonic booty call. You and your 3 songwriters have provided no evidence this proposed Saturday night fling will be anything more than another round on the carousel of manipulation, use, and rejection that you and your feminine puppet have been riding for however long this has gone on.
Now you're telling me that the lady has a steady partner she runs to when you rip her heart out Aztec style? AND HE IS THE F***ING BAD GUY IN THIS SCENARIO?! IT IS A BAD THING THAT HE'S "SAFE"?!?!!?!
I'll be right back once I'm done throwing up everything I have eaten in the month of July...
And you're scared.
Of you, bro-douche. Of you and your Master's Degree in Musical Sociopathy from Nashville's prestigious Music Row Institute for the Demolition of a Once-Respected Genre.
I'd be scared too.
Of everything you're feelin'
when we're burnin' the midnight down again.
You can't burn midnight down. It is not a place. You can burn your house down. You can burn a city down (not that I'd like to do that to any very specific places right now). You cannot burn down midnight. Not even if you light a clock on fire.
Chorus goes again, but somehow there's only 2 more "new" lines in the last 1 minute and 50 seconds of the song. If that isn't a metaphor for something, I don't know what is.
Every goodbye is bittersweet.
So why should we fight what we both need?
I dunno. Because she's clearly got someone who doesn't cause her emotional trauma? Because short-term impulses need to be controlled for greater long-term good? Because basic impulse control is one of the things that separates humans from less advanced species? Because you've only expressed a want to a person who may or may not actually be interested?
Oh, I forgot. She's a woman in a Florida Georgia Line song. She doesn't actually get input. My bad.
Recommended Alternative Listening: Here. This is a George Jones song about a man who actually loved a woman and did not stop until he died. Here is an aching Hayes Carll tune about a relationship that didn't work out. Here's an up tempo Brooks & Dunn tune that expresses love in a non-douchey manner. Here's Patsy Cline falling to pieces longing for love. Lastly, we have Amy LaVere giving what could be a good response to the song I have reviewed here.
Alternately, catch Florida Georgia Line's new single here. I think it's an improvement.
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