(born December 2, 1983) is an American actress and country music singer. She is best known for her role as Alex Dupre on the television series, One Tree Hill.
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[4.14]
Anthony Easton: This seems so retrograde. We have all had that lump in the throat that comes when an ex-lover is seen again, and that tension between wanting to fuck and knowing that fucking again is the worst idea imaginable. It’s not a new idea, and it’s not very well presented here, but after a decade of women who have been really good at expressing the ambiguity of their sexual autonomy, the track here seems to go back to arguing that she doesn’t really have much control. This might be because of her bland vocals and the slightly stale production. There is a difference between wanting someone and being made to want someone, and this song doesn’t articulate the importance of that difference.
[4]
Jonathan Bogart: The only thing that could save this song is being a massive hit, so that it accretes imputed meaning. It has none on its own.
[4]
Iain Mew: Has he had a change of heart and decided that he wants to start over with Jana but just can’t straight out say it? Is he actually trying to be a friend and cheerfully oblivious to her ungluedness? Is he deliberately being cruel? No answers, but the song is well crafted enough to make me care a bit, which is something.
[6]
Alfred Soto: Those unexpected choral enjambments save this boilerplate pop specimen. To say it’s country means you’ve overrated the role of the pedal steel.
[4]
Brad Shoup: Terrible cadences: pushed and powerless. The backing vocals seem to mock (the listener, not the singer). And can I make a suggestion? If you liked the shirt that much, just hang onto it. He’ll deal. Or he’ll gain thirty pounds and have to deal.
[2]
Will Adams: “Why can’t you be cold like any good ex would do,” is the kind of sentiment I endured far too much of in high school; those people who engineer scenarios to get them in a high emotional state, and then blame it on everyone around them while simultaneously enjoying the attention. To their credit, none of them set that manipulation to a klutzy melody.
[3]
Katherine St Asaph: Country music, like video games and horror film, tends to exist ten years behind technology. So while small-town encounters with the involuntary ex tend to look a lot like yours might — “why you gotta exist, still, with your Gchat dot green and dimples on your Instagram and those fragmentary shards” — we’re in storytelling land: a schoolyard, maybe, or a diner, someplace you can hide. The song’s old-fashioned, too, sounding more like Edie Brickell than modern country (or perhaps exactly timely, considering modern male country keeps sounding like ’90s rock.) It’s meant to be timeless, and it works, at least for anyone who’s wondered why if someone flung you out of his life he couldn’t at least have the courtesy of finishing by flinging you out the first-floor window, where the only things hugging you are shards of glass. You’ve likely realized how ridiculous that is; Jana does by line one and “this tiny town” where she somehow encounters him, but the lilt of the melody and trailed-off coda prevent any fire or closure from interrupting the would-be affairs. It’s deceptively, unearnedly pleasant, which doesn’t make for timeless singles but is true, at least, to life.
[6]