SAM HUNT - Country House - MCA Records Nashville

Who hasn’t rolled down their windows and cranked up “Body Like A Back Road,” “House Party,” “Kinfolks,” “Leave The Night On,” or “Hard To Forget?” That said, Sam Hunt is certainly recognized by the modern era music fan; absolutely within the country genre but also by the several that he’s drawn in from the outside through his crossover appeal.

With “Outskirts” earning him another chart-topper earlier this month, and the title track of his recent 4-song EP Locked Up currently landing impact at radio, he now strikes with “Country House.”

Written by Hunt, Ross Copperman, Michael Lotten, and Josh Osborne, the third of the four songs released from the EP bears sonic familiarity to the older hits of his catalog, allowing Hunt to work his vocal within its most comfortable range as he offers a black and white snapshot of where life is at today with a family to call his own.

The simplicity of the acoustic guitar lays the addictive foundations as it gives way to what Hunt uniquely does best, lacing a pop laden backbeat into the feel-good flow of the melody as he begins to run through descriptive lyrics in each of the verses to outline the outskirts (no pun intended) style of life that he wants to build with his better half.

Painting a picture of the desired lifestyle, with a heavy on old-fashioned morals and values, Hunt sings about wanting the type of down a dirt road place where there’s a Bible by the bed, chickens on the roof, beans growing out back in a field, and where they can raise a bunch of kids and pray together at night before going to bed.

Flirtatious and playful in its ways, he strikes the irresistible sway of the chorus with an expert balance between the idea of the type of house that he wants to have versus the definition of the type of home he wants to grow with her:

“Baby, I wanna live in a country house, in a country house with you
I want a stove full of wood and coal on a hill with a heavenly view
Where the days are longer and our love gets stronger
And the grass is a little bit blue
Cuttin' wood for the whittle of it, out in the middle of the country
In a country house with you, you”

Sam Hunt has always walked the edge of the country music line, unapologetically going against the grain while finding his place in the modern era with a resume full of smash hits.

As he opens this next chapter of his life, and his music, he’s clearly discovered a freeing happiness in the things that matter most. His recent output is naturally then a reflection of his newfound lease on life as he sits squarely in the comfort zone of what he does best musically while dutifully injecting flavors of contentment into the maturity of the lyrics to intriguingly set the tone of the next era of Sam Hunt.

(Review Written By: Jeffrey Kurtis)

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