The Singles Jukebox

We’ll see if it sets the world alight as much as Paisley-Lovato did

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Thomas Inskeep: Two years ago, about Chesney’s “American Kids,” I said, “Chesney likes to go to the well of reminiscence a lot — he’s done it on 2001’s “Don’t Happen Twice,” 2004’s “I Go Back,” and 2010’s “The Boys of Fall,” to name just a trio of top-two country singles — but it’s something he does well because he makes you believe him.” As he approaches 50 (!), it makes increasing sense for him to keep it up (it’s certainly served Alan Jackson well), and as he’s approaching 50 and Country Radio Never-Never Land, it also makes sense for him to call for backup. Which helps explain the presence of P!nk, singing her lungs out as she tends to do on such inspirational material, as much  aspirational too. The production stays out of the way. And Chesney, as ever, is sturdy. The pairing is a smart, savvy, and ultimately good one.
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Katie Gill: P!nk on mediocre songs about fire continues! The mixing on that chorus is abysmal, with P!nk steamrollering over Chesney’s vocals. I suppose it’s payment for the fact that she doesn’t really do anything in this song. P!nk’s undoubtedly expensive, a bigger name in the music industry as a whole than Chesney, who’s main contribution to his genre is a beachy puka shells aesthetic and “She Thinks My Tractor’s Sexy.” Why have her on your song if she’s not even gonna get a verse?
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Edward Okulicz: If Chesney had “being eaten alive and shown up completely by Pink” on his life goals list he can consider it well and truly crossed off. I like soft rock AOR as a sound on Pink (see “Try” for a relatively non overplayed peak) and she knows how to do windswept soft focus special effect dream sequence nostalgia. Chesney sounds like it’s his first take after a lobotomy.
[7]

Alfred Soto: Hell, if Brad Paisley can sing with Demi Lovato….This one begins with a wistful synth cloud through which Chesney gazes at stars and piers and empty beers and “meers” or whatever lipstick’s smeared on. P!nk sounds a hell of a lot more present than Chesney — she knows how to make sentimental garbage like this count. But why pay her fee for just a chorus?
[4]

Cassy Gress: Why would Kenny Chesney and Pink set a country song about being young and reckless in West Hollywood? He’s from Tennessee and she’s from Pennsylvania; La Cienega Blvd. is oddly specific, and if this were a more storytelling or fictional sort of song it would probably be set in third person. I think it’s more likely that they’re singing about being middle-aged but acting like 20-year-olds and screaming on the pier and writing in lipstick on the mirror. As someone approaching middle age herself, I’m put off by it. Strange sentiment aside, I almost wrote that this sounds like riding in a convertible on the highway at sunset, but it doesn’t — it wants to, but it sounds so soullessly generic about it.
[3]

Gin Hart: This sounds romantic and nice and oh god I’m very embarrassed. 
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