Today is my birthday and I’m in Boston visiting my family for the first time since the pandemic started (another post on that later). The only reason that I have a post today is because I pre-wrote and scheduled this. It turns out that the song I heard that I knew I wanted to write about is not new at all, but hey as the old NBC slogan used to say about re-runs, it’s new to me. Perhaps it will be new to you too. If not, why did no one tell me about it?

I first heard this song on the radio on my way home from a friend’s kid’s birthday party last weekend. I’m woefully out of touch with new country music at the moment because in the past there were two ways that I really kept up with country music neither of which have really been a thing since the pandemic started. I have my alarm clock (Yes, I still use a clock radio for my alarm. It’s the same one I got for Christmas when I was like 8.) set to the local country radio station. Thus I used to hear country music lying in bed until I dragged myself up and then also while I was getting ready for work. Now however the time I get out of bed has shifted and thus it’s now such that I almost always wake up before my alarm even goes off and then when I’m getting ready for work I’m in a space of time that’s almost always commercials and the DJs talking rather than playing music. I also listen to the radio while I’m driving, but I haven’t done a whole lot of that in the past year and half either so I’m not too up on the new pop music or country music that I would also hear in the car.

So you’ll forgive me for having not heard “Freedom Was a Highway” by Jimmie Allen and Brad Paisley until this past week even though it came out almost a year ago. It’s off of Allen’s EP Bettie James, which is a collaborative album with some of country’s biggest stars on each of the songs. To me it’s a perfect country song. Country music always feels ideal for the summer and this song has the quintessential summer beat. It also does what country songs do best in evoking a feeling of nostalgia for a simpler time in our lives, but without being schmaltzy about it like too many country songs are. Also it’s not about trucks or half naked women or drinking, which is too much of a rarity these days in mainstream country music. I just really, really love the guitar work in this song. It’s such a good country song and I literally have had it on repeat since I first heard it. I hope you love it as much as I do.