For a moment I thought the fellow in the video was A. Ostroff of this parish…
[Video][Website]
[5.50]
Anthony Easton: The guy in the video is really really attractive, but you figure if he has a beard he should have chest hair. Also, he should be seen more, and the whole Annette Funicello Beach Blanket Bingo retro-mania should most likely be cut back. Also, her voice is really grating.
[2]
Alfred Soto: A throwback to Jessica Simpson circa 2000, when white tanktops and a 100-watt grins and a couple of acoustic strums meant pop nirvana. Times have changed. Where is the sonic oomph?
[5]
Daniel Montesinos-Donaghy: Unremarkable cuteness — inundated with the snap-to-attention sensation of young love but disregards the hot rush, the sudden sense of adventure, the joy.
[5]
Katherine St Asaph: There is a nonzero chance I went to acting camp with this girl, which is bizarre. (No, it’s relevant; this makes a lot more sense when you find out she was a Baby June type.) The song’s fine, a pastiche of Taylor Swift (early and mid-career), vocal twiddles both country and Carly Rae, and a memoirist’s version of summer roads. It’s like a perfect audition, by which I mean there are hundreds more just like it.
[6]
Brad Shoup: Fuck an artificial construct like “summertime”. How else can we fully appreciate a brutally streamlined country/bubblegum/nu-disco gem that arrives in late August, practically baked in amber? There’s that coquettish rhythm guitar part, the pneumatic backbeat in the chorus, and Houghton’s astounding vocals, summoning nostalgia in the verses, jumping to firework height for the chorus, approaching something existential in the bridge. It’s a clinic of cadence, and I haven’t even gotten to the phrase “kiss me ‘cross the console”: finally, some truck lovin’ with some lived experience.
[9]
Iain Mew: Sometimes a song being lightweight is a good thing because the one shining part is the only bit that needs to make any impact or be remembered, and this is one of those times. The bit in question is the way the chorus suddenly hits celebratory bliss midway, bells chiming and Houghton turning up a barely hinted at charm and happiness full blast.
[7]
Jonathan Bogart: I guess 90s revivalism means that one teenpop strategy is to try to sound like Sheryl Crow now. From Taylor Swift to Haim, it’s had a certain amount of success; but the pretty rush of the middle eight is the only reason to listen to something this insubstantial.
[5]
David Lee: Houghton’s weird inflection on the word “high” recalls Rihanna’s unfortunate “Shine bright like a diamOND” clenching. And I’m not sure who to blame for her dissection of “cloud nine” into fifteen staccato yelps. (Katy Perry comes to mind.) Otherwise? This is country-pop cotton candy that manages to squeeze into the ever-narrowing slot between the end of heat-baked pavement and the beginning of morning frost. Which is to say, “High” doesn’t reach the elevations it aspires to, but it definitely floats.
[5]