The Singles Jukebox

A song for Sept 22…

[Video]
[4.67]

Katherine St Asaph: I’ve always wondered: Do summer flings actually exist, or are they a hoax perpetuated by YM Magazine, the bikini and cutoff jorts industries, and pleasant country songs? (Do you just need to be rich enough to have a summer house or study-abroad, and thus a defined start and end date?) Regardless, this is a full-hearted take on it. Bradbery channels a little of the earnestness of Kacey Musgraves, plus a little of the fluting ingenue that’s increasingly rare. But Rhett’s verse, diffident and uninvested, makes me suspect there is a secret third verse where he crows “and she was good, you know what I mean.”
[6]

Alfred Soto: In Danielle Bradbery’s timbre I can hear the regret that every season turns. There isn’t much else beyond airbrushed bombast, and Thomas Rhett hides under his hat.
[4]

Stephen Eisermann: I don’t know how Danielle and Thomas expect us to believe that they had this wonderful fling when all they tell us in this song is how it ended. The power country-pop production is pretty sleek, though, so that’s nice.
[4]

Alex Clifton: I’ve never had a summer fling, mostly because it seemed like a useless concept–give your heart away for a bit of fun and then have to recoup the consequences later. Bradbery and Rhett do actually sound quite nice here, but this song does nothing to change my mind.
[4]

Joshua Minsoo Kim: A perfunctory relationship story that tries to capture how quickly a summer fling passes by crafting a montage that only really includes its beginning and end. I suppose it aligns nicely with the hello/goodbye lyrics that are employed, but it fails to make “Goodbye Summer” feel like anything more than hollow, vague sentiment.
[3]

Will Adams: An interesting inversion on the country-crossover formula: the original “Hello Summer” sounded like the thin pop mixes Taylor Swift used to do, and it’s the remix that dials up the country via a duet partner and gleaming pop-rock production. It fits the narrative well. The outset of summer often promises the surface happiness of trop-house synths and vocal squiggles; by the end, the sun has worn you down, the mosquitoes are unbearable and the season slipping away is a small-scale reminder of how time in general is slipping away. The summer fling fluff is rather low-stakes, but the soaring guitars and the pair’s commitment recreate the drama well. 
[7]