Joe Nichols - "Hard To Be Cool"

[dm2081]

gfa.radioandrecords.com/PublishGFA/GFANextPage.asp?sDate=09/01/2014&Format=4
Going for adds September 1st.
Writers: Bob Hatch & Jason Sellers
Audio:

[Markus Meyer]

Solid choice. Not earth shattering but definitely a pleasant listen.

[tim]

This should easily give Joe yet another hit at radio if not get him to the top of the charts for his third #1 song in a row. The only downside possibly is the high recurrent airplay of "Sunny and 75" and "Yeah," but radio has been loving everything from Crickets so far.

I think Joe still has at least another hit song after HTBC, possibly "Baby You're In Love With Me" or "Just Let Me Be In Love With You."

[kw9461]

Was hoping for Just Let Me Fall In Love With You, but this'll do just fine. It's catchy, has a strong melody, and should have no trouble being another hit for Joe. Joe did a nice job in finding songs that clearly fall into country radio's narrow scope, but without pandering or going bro. And at least in Joe's songs the good looking women hold all the cards - you know, just like in real life. A third straight #1 might be too much to ask, but top 10 shouldn't be a problem. Hopefully it performs well enough for Red Bow to be more risky with the 4th single (like BBR did with Randy Houser), I'd love to see one of the more traditional tracks get a chance at radio.

[ezherman]

Ugh, I was afraid of that after seeing his live show. The one line in the song that makes me cringe and dislike the whole song: "She's so hot... what's not to love?"

I can't wait until the pendulum swings back toward center and we get some substance in our country songs. And songs that actually give some respect to women.

[sabre14]

Good safe choice by Red Bow. I like kw9461 would have went with "Just Let Me Fall In Love With You", or even "Baby You're In Love With Me" as the third single but the entire Crickets album is outstanding other than "Y'ant To" and "Hee Haw". Hopefully Joe's hit making days are here to stay for a while with the great success of "Sunny And 75" and "Yeah". I'm really hoping that this can do well (and I think it should) so we can get a fourth release from this album. I once again agree with kw9461 in that would perhaps mean a "risk" for a final single like "Better Than Beautiful", and a total outside chance of "Old School Country Song". Though I think I'm just kidding myself that they would even seriously consider that song as a single.

[kw9461]

Aug 5, 2014 22:38:41 GMT -5 ezherman said:

Ugh, I was afraid of that after seeing his live show. The one line in the song that makes me cringe and dislike the whole song: "She's so hot... what's not to love?"

I can't wait until the pendulum swings back toward center and we get some substance in our country songs. And songs that actually give some respect to women.

True, the chorus is rather crude, but it's really not him objectifying the woman, but more rationalizing being with someone he knows is going to break his heart. It's very much a kin to Eric Church's "Hell On The Heart" and Terri Clark's "Easy On The Eyes", though a bit more tact would made this a better song.

[dm2081]

Aug 5, 2014 22:38:41 GMT -5 ezherman said:

Ugh, I was afraid of that after seeing his live show. The one line in the song that makes me cringe and dislike the whole song: "She's so hot... what's not to love?"

I can't wait until the pendulum swings back toward center and we get some substance in our country songs. And songs that actually give some respect to women.

I don't see this as disrespectful.  In fact, I think this line shows the error in falling for someone just based on their looks alone, and shows the need for more caution.  As for the song, I think this was the best choice they could make.  It's extremely catchy and has a great melody.  I think this song will go over well with both fans of traditional sounding country, and should also be decent/modern enough for fans of the "bro" demographic.  I would be shocked if this song didn't go at least top 5.  When the album came out, this song instantly screamed "big hit" to me.  I actually prefer this song to "Yeah", and that's saying a lot because I was a pretty big fan of "Yeah".  I'm not too worried about his recent reccurrents because this song probably won't even peak until March or so.

[.indulgecountry]

Another perfect single choice from this great album, imo. "Hard to Be Cool" is another one of my favorites on Crickets, and sounds like another smash hit to me. I expect this to continue to keep his momentum up, and I'd just be floored if this were another No. 1 hit, though I'd be happy with Top 10.

[Dustin J.]

This is yet another great choice from an album full of solid material. Personally, this is one of my faves from "Crickets".

[rsmatto]

Given that September 1 is Labor Day, I'd imagine the true Add date will be "September 2."

Aug 5, 2014 22:38:41 GMT -5 ezherman said:

Ugh, I was afraid of that after seeing his live show. The one line in the song that makes me cringe and dislike the whole song: "She's so hot... what's not to love?"

I can't wait until the pendulum swings back toward center and we get some substance in our country songs. And songs that actually give some respect to women.

"She's so hot, hey what's not to love?"
Heaven's little devil's got me all messed up
She's a little heartbreaker and I'm her fool
She's so hot it's hard to be cool
Hard to be cool."

I don't see how that is any sort of "disrespect" to women. I don't even see how that could make someone cringe. feels like you're pulling one line out of a song without the benefit of what else is around the song in the lyric. It's clearly about that emotion when you meet someone who strikes your fancy so much that you do not know what to say or do. We've all been there at some point. Honestly, we all try to be 'cool' when we come across types of people like this. A good example would be when people 'stutter' or cannot speak around celebrities they meet for the first time.

[tim]

I actually enjoy the "She's so hot, hey what's not to love" lyric. I don't see anything about this one line that makes the song disrespectful.

I was intrigued of the history behind the "what's not to love" saying and did a little homework. From The Phase Finder:

The earliest example of 'what's not to like?' in print is in Dorothy Kilgallen's review of the film Charade in the 'Voice of Broadway' column in the New York newspaper The Dunkirk Evening Observer, September 1963:

"It has Audrey Hepburn, Cary Grant, Paris in living color, and a beautiful score by Henry Mancini. So what's not to like?"

The 'what's not to love?' spinoff variant started in 1974, as part of Volkswagen's advertising copy for a limited edition range of Beetle models that were styled on the Love Bug that featured in Disney's eponymous 1968 film.



What's not to love indeed!

[Ten Pound Hammer]

Two Jason Sellers songs off the album? Wow, Jason's been quiet for a long time, but now everyone's cutting his songs again. I approve.

[tvoss20]

Was really hoping Smile On Mine (tied with Yeah for his best song ever) would be the next choice. This is a solid choice nonetheless.

[ezherman]

Aug 5, 2014 23:17:19 GMT -5 dm2081 said:

Aug 5, 2014 22:38:41 GMT -5 ezherman said:

Ugh, I was afraid of that after seeing his live show. The one line in the song that makes me cringe and dislike the whole song: "She's so hot... what's not to love?"

I can't wait until the pendulum swings back toward center and we get some substance in our country songs. And songs that actually give some respect to women.

I don't see this as disrespectful.  In fact, I think this line shows the error in falling for someone just based on their looks alone, and shows the need for more caution.  As for the song, I think this was the best choice they could make.  It's extremely catchy and has a great melody.  I think this song will go over well with both fans of traditional sounding country, and should also be decent/modern enough for fans of the "bro" demographic.  I would be shocked if this song didn't go at least top 5.  When the album came out, this song instantly screamed "big hit" to me.  I actually prefer this song to "Yeah", and that's saying a lot because I was a pretty big fan of "Yeah".  I'm not too worried about his recent reccurrents because this song probably won't even peak until March or so.

I just listened to it again and I cringed each time Joe exclaimed, "She's so HOT..."

I'm just so disappointed in how shallow the theme in this song is. It doesn't sound like a song that a 37 year old dad should be singing about and I think that Joe is so much better than this song. Call me an old fart (I'm younger than Joe) but country love songs used to be about how a girl (woman) makes you feel and your relationship with her, instead of how good she looks in her tight jeans or Daisy Dukes. The closest we've had recently was Chris Young's "Who I Am With You."

I still stand behind my feeling that this song doesn't give full respect to who the woman really is. He is hoping for at least a hook-up or short-lived fling. 'Cuz "she's so HOT."

And yes, it IS catchy as hell...

[dm2081]

Aug 6, 2014 20:34:59 GMT -5 ezherman said:

Aug 5, 2014 23:17:19 GMT -5 dm2081 said:

I just listened to it again and I cringed each time Joe exclaimed, "She's so HOT..."

I'm just so disappointed in how shallow the theme in this song is. It doesn't sound like a song that a 37 year old dad should be singing about and I think that Joe is so much better than this song. Call me an old fart (I'm younger than Joe) but country love songs used to be about how a girl (woman) makes you feel and your relationship with her, instead of how good she looks in her tight jeans or Daisy Dukes. The closest we've had recently was Chris Young's "Who I Am With You."

I still stand behind my feeling that this song doesn't give full respect to who the woman really is. He is hoping for at least a hook-up or short-lived fling. 'Cuz "she's so HOT."

And yes, it IS catchy as hell...

But the whole point of the song is that THE FEMALE is the shallow one.  She is not looking for something serious, like the male narrator is, so he is heartbroken and a fool for it because of it.  He's not looking for a hook-up, he's looking for a long-term relationship.  That's at least the way I interpreted the song.  Like how it says "She's a little heart breaker and I'm her fool".  If he was just looking to hook up, then he wouldn't be sad about the situation.

[rsmatto]

Aug 6, 2014 20:34:59 GMT -5 ezherman said:

Aug 5, 2014 23:17:19 GMT -5 dm2081 said:

I don't see this as disrespectful.  In fact, I think this line shows the error in falling for someone just based on their looks alone, and shows the need for more caution.  As for the song, I think this was the best choice they could make.  It's extremely catchy and has a great melody.  I think this song will go over well with both fans of traditional sounding country, and should also be decent/modern enough for fans of the "bro" demographic.  I would be shocked if this song didn't go at least top 5.  When the album came out, this song instantly screamed "big hit" to me.  I actually prefer this song to "Yeah", and that's saying a lot because I was a pretty big fan of "Yeah".  I'm not too worried about his recent reccurrents because this song probably won't even peak until March or so.

I just listened to it again and I cringed each time Joe exclaimed, "She's so HOT..."

I'm just so disappointed in how shallow the theme in this song is. It doesn't sound like a song that a 37 year old dad should be singing about and I think that Joe is so much better than this song. Call me an old fart (I'm younger than Joe) but country love songs used to be about how a girl (woman) makes you feel and your relationship with her, instead of how good she looks in her tight jeans or Daisy Dukes. The closest we've had recently was Chris Young's "Who I Am With You."

I still stand behind my feeling that this song doesn't give full respect to who the woman really is. He is hoping for at least a hook-up or short-lived fling. 'Cuz "she's so HOT."

And yes, it IS catchy as hell...

You're missing the point and may even be a bit too sensitive about the usage of "hot" here. The song's lyrics are not objectifying a woman in the way that some "bro" songs seem to. She's just so gorgeous (or even 'out of his league') that the man is so befuddled that every time he's around her that he's a fool and very 'un cool' with what he says or does. That's it. That's all there is to the song's lyrics. It's about a situation we've ALL been in before in our lives at one point or another (as I said almost exactly above). (On a side note, about the word "Hot"," trust me from a songwriting sense, for song flow reasons, it's easier to say "Hot" than it is 'beautiful' or 'gorgeous' which are the same type of adjectives. It just flows better).

[mylifeback]

Catchy song, I like it. Never was a fan of Sunny & 75 and Yeah had to grow on me. This is much more immediate.

[phil1996]

The entire album is just incredible. Absolutely amazing. 13/16 of the songs on "Crickets" are absolute gems. Wasn't ever a huge Joe Nichols fan until "Crickets" happened. Now I'm a huge fan of him. Kind of how I was with Eric Church when "Chief" happened.

[sabre14]

Aug 7, 2014 21:43:11 GMT -5 phil1996 said:

The entire album is just incredible. Absolutely amazing. 13/16 of the songs on "Crickets" are absolute gems. Wasn't ever a huge Joe Nichols fan until "Crickets" happened. Now I'm a huge fan of him. Kind of how I was with Eric Church when "Chief" happened.

I too love Crickets (great album name by the way) and think most of the songs range from good to outstanding. But Joe's been putting out pretty solid albums for a while now IMO. His Man With A Memory album was stellar outside of "Everything's A Thing" (to this day I really don't quite know what the heck the song's about). I loved III. Great songs left as album tracks such as "Freedom Feels Like Lonely", "Talk Me Out Of Tampa", "Should I Go Home (Or Should I Go Crazy)", and "As Country As She Gets". And Real Things was stellar as well.

[jferstler]

I'll echo the last couple posters and say that Crickets has been my favorite album of the last few years. It's mixed with just the right amount of traditional and contemporary country and I haven't seen anyone else that can do that as well as Joe except maybe Jon Pardi or Randy Houser. Very excited about where Joe's career may be heading.

[tim]

^I as well have to echo the three previous posts in how overall great this album is. As sabre14 said above, Joe has been consistent in putting out great albums going back to Man With A Memory (although I also think his debut album Joe Nichols from 1996 was just as good). I'm really hoping that the CMA's throw in a curve ball in the album of the year category with Crickets and give us something other than the usual A-List artist nomination run down.

[zjames]

This song's alright. It doesn't do much for me right now, but I can easily see myself turning this up when it comes on the radio. I haven't listened to Crickets yet, but clearly I need to get on that.

[.indulgecountry]

This sounded GREAT when he did it live last night. Definitely looking forward to hearing this on the radio. He's really doing everything right this era and I love it. I sincerely hope he can keep his momentum up! We need more neo-traditional country artists like him to continue to stay relevant.

At his show he also took a little shot at the trend of putting rap in country songs. He made it sound like he wasn't really a fan without outright condemning it, and then he joked and said he was adding some rap to the show to fit in, before he covered "Baby Got Back" in the most neo-traditional country way possible. It was hilarious, lol.

[.indulgecountry]

Lyric video is now out: www.rollingstone.com/music/videos/joe-nichols-hard-to-be-cool-lyric-video-20140902

Given that his last two singles, "Sunny and 75" and "Yeah," both hit Number One, Joe Nichols sees no reason to bring down the tempo. He reveals exclusively to Rolling Stone Country that the similarly upbeat love song, "Hard to Be Cool" is the next radio release from his latest album, Crickets.

"It's surprised me how popular it is in the live show," he says of the tune, written by Rob Hatch and Jason Sellers. "That's a good indicator of what album cuts should be singles: when people are singing every word to it, and they get excited right after hearing the intro."

"Hard to Be Cool" just barely made it onto the album. Nichols was in a recording studio about to cut a different song as the last track for Crickets when the head of his record label, Benny Brown walked in with Sellers' demo of the song.

"Benny came by and said, 'You've gotta check this out.' I said, 'It's pretty late in the process. I don't know about that….,'" the singer recalls. "But he played it and I immediately said, 'We've gotta cut it!' It's a fun song. But it's also frightening, because Jason sang on the demo and he's a great singer. So you want to at least sing it as good as he did, which is intimidating."

The "Hard to Be Cool" lyric video, which makes its exclusive debut on Rolling Stone Country, stars a brunette video vixen ("heaven's little devil") heating things up in a snow cone truck. Directed by Ford Fairchild and Christina Cooper, the video spells out the song's lyrics in several different flavors. Watch it above.

[ethanhunt]

I can't find it in me to like of Joe's material. I guess it's his voice that bothers me. For example I think Yeah would've been much better if by another artist, say Rascal Flatts

[Deleted]

A solid start for this one. It debuts at #53 on Billboard and is 2nd most-added with 37 adds at Mediabase, which makes for a first-week total of 48 adds (including station adds from last week).

I enjoy this one a lot. It's another contemporary offering from Joe, but it still sounds 'country', and he sounds really good singing it. It's not the best song I've ever heard, but it has good, relatable lyrics, and it definitely sounds like something that today's country radio will play.

I think this could be a 3rd consecutive #1 for Joe, but if not, I think it will go at least top 10.

[dm2081]

Cool add for this one too in Country Aircheck Weekly too. "This song's so hot it's... Hard to be Cool". Clever choice of words there.

[Ten Pound Hammer]

Sept 2, 2014 17:15:14 GMT -5 ethanhunt said:

I can't find it in me to like of Joe's material. I guess it's his voice that bothers me. For example I think Yeah would've been much better if by another artist, say Rascal Flatts

The only time I had problems with Joe's voice was when they slathered it in Auto-Tune on Gimmie That Girl. Seriously, what was up with that?

And I agree with kw9461, this does go down quite easily and fits into radio without feeling like it's pandering or beneath Joe.

[sabre14]

Sept 3, 2014 0:43:15 GMT -5 Ten Pound Hammer said:

Sept 2, 2014 17:15:14 GMT -5 ethanhunt said:

I can't find it in me to like of Joe's material. I guess it's his voice that bothers me. For example I think Yeah would've been much better if by another artist, say Rascal Flatts

The only time I had problems with Joe's voice was when they slathered it in Auto-Tune on Gimmie That Girl. Seriously, what was up with that?

And I agree with kw9461, this does go down quite easily and fits into radio without feeling like it's pandering or beneath Joe.

I had a bigger problem with the production in "It Ain't No Crime" myself but "Gimme That Girl" was also a unlike Joe violator.

And IMO, picturing Gary singing "Yeah" instead of Joe is just unpleasant. I think Joe has one of the best vocals of any male in country music.