The Singles Jukebox

Never has a name been so suited to bro country than Jon Pardi (rock is in the houuuuse tonight), and yet…

[Video][Website]
[5.29]

Will Adams: In which Jon Pardi belly flops on a plodding rhythm and uninspired title that’s not nearly as clever as it thinks it is.
[3]

Alfred Soto: Not once has Luke Laird lent his name to a song as tired and lazy as “Head Over Boots,” therefore I’m inclined to blame co-writer Jon Pardi, who thought playing with the title was a show of wit.
[3]

Ryo Miyauchi: I wish Jon Pardi didn’t stop at “head over boots” because the other cliches — the king and queen, the rock and roll — could use some charming twists too. But much like his well-worn love story and the balmy slide guitar delivering it, the cliches reliably hit some sort of feeling.
[5]

Adaora Ede: Excusing the elementary slant rhymes that create the titular lyric and most of the other verses (like, thoroughly excusing them, I’m sure I’ve heard more complex country lyrics out of the Hannah Montana soundtracks), Jon Pardi knows how to create a lush love song out of formula. The instrumentation is bare-bones — a little guitar, a little fiddle, a little bass, just enough to appeal to the fundamentals of romance. It could just be the traditional style that “Head Over Boots” parrots, but it has been a long time since a country song has made me feel as warm and fuzzy inside as this.
[6]

Cassy Gress: Leave it to a country song, with a well-worn I-V-vi-IV chord progression and a slightly-too-nasal singer, to make me feel sad about never having been asked to dance.
[6]

Thomas Inskeep: Lyrically this is pretty simple, but I find this ever-so-charming musically, marrying a ’50s swing with a ’90s country sensibility. Pardi’s vocal is slightly awkward — he’s got an odd voice, kinda thin for country music — but that actually adds to its appeal. There’s a sweet quality to “Head Over Boots” that you don’t hear much in contemporary music, and for that alone I’m a fan.
[7]

Peter Ryan: This is exceedingly polite, unquestionably chaste, and completely charming. Pardi’s vocal is so nondescript and the chorus so big that it basically lives or dies by the strength of his band, but the swing and harmonies and intermingling fiddle/slide guitar all shoulder their shares of the weight. And Pardi gets considerably more mileage out of the verses, where he can show off the elastic sweetness of his voice in relative isolation. There’s not much here that hasn’t been done to death, but the dosages are all correct — all encapsulated by the perfectly-fleeting half-time bridge, with its beautifully-obvious “I’m here to pick you up and I hope I don’t let you down.” It pays to know exactly when enough is enough.
[7]