MAE ESTES - Good Ol' Boys - Big Machine Records

Country music has been defined for generations as “three chords and the truth,” pulling the heartbeat of the genre from a quote that the legendary songwriter Harlan Howard once made in the 1950’s. While the genre ever since has shifted its ebbs and flows to fit whatever the current sound is at the time, at its very core these five words are the strong foothold which it always stands upon.

But define “truth.” Truth isn’t only the good stuff in life, but it’s also the bad, the very bad, and the even worse. Life can be disrupted by a disastrous turn that leaves you in the trenches with open wounds that never heal; Keeping you stuck in moments of hurt and pain, reliving the nightmares over and over again.

Modern era traditionalist Mae Estes is the powerfully wavering voice that’s found its signature in cutting through the static to deliver truth through song, whether it’s tugging heartstrings on “Thinkin’ Bout Cheatin’” or transparently laying her industry woes on the table with “High and Lonesome.”

She’s gently now creaking open the often- closed door on the heavy topic of abuse with her brand-new single, “Good Ol’ Boys.”

Though naturally carrying a weightiness within her subdued vocals as they pace along the haunting, Appalachian infused melody, the song written by Estes, Marti Dodson, SJ McDonald, and Autumn McEntire becomes a shining light of hope that gives you permission to talk about the things you were never meant to talk about while finding the jagged pieces of your fractured healing one conversation at a time.

Painting vivid description of the outward deceptions of the abuser, she first showcases his alluringness as him being the gentlemanly, Sunday morning church going type who daddy might give his blessing to, before then shifting to a now perspective in the second verse to trace the damaging wounds that she still carries inside today because of who he was to her behind closed doors.

By never pinpointing the exact type of hell that he put her through, and by carefully gripping the trapped feeling of unbalanced regrets in the loss of innocence, “I can’t unlearn what I wish I didn’t know,” the lyric stays completely open to a listener interpretation that allows them to place their own “hell” into their connection to the song:

“I gave you my heart and you gave me hell

Gave me a secret and who’d believe it if I ever got the nerve to tell

Ain’t it a shame, I’ll never see them the same

You give good ‘ol boys a bad name”

“There is all kinds of heartbreak in life and Country music, but nothing hits harder than the heartbreak that comes from someone you never expected to hurt you” explains Estes. “I was raised in a small town in the south, surrounded by honest, hardworking, godly, well-mannered men that we lovingly called ‘good ol’ boys.’ This important song shares the persecutive of a heartbroken woman, forever changed by the betrayal of a man she thought she could trust. I have such respect and admiration for the ‘three chords and the truth’ sentiment of traditional Country music and tried my best to channel that when writing this unapologetic story.”

(Review Written By: Jeffrey Kurtis/Artwork c/o Big Machine Records)