Nick Tressler Raised Rowdy Founder
Relationships are complicated and Faren Rachel’s new single “Smoke” tells the tale of a love that on the outside seems perfect, but from the inside the story is a lot more complex. If an outsider saw the couple that are the story’s central characters you might think that they had a perfect love. A love where the couple know all of each others secrets and love them for who they are, but love, real love isn’t all flowers and sunshine and this track explores the female’s perspective on what is amiss.
The writers on the track (Nicolette Hayford, Jake Mitchell and Hailey Whitters) really give this song life. They weave a twisted web of secrets one line at a time while still showing the power that this new love has already. The story’s layers peel away so many details that start to really show the greyness of the song and the mind-space of the narrator’s emotions. The best songs are vivid and real and this track does not fall short on either.
Faren’s vocals really unleash the message and the production is honestly perfect (shoutout to Grady Block). Faren’s brazen demeanor seems more vulnerable than her previous tracks. The song has moments where you can just feel Faren take her heart out and bear it, but seemingly only to herself. Then you get the details that are causing that internal struggle her voice shares so well. The good is so good that she almost can’t be fully honest about where she and her heart currently reside. It is an emotional roller-coaster of internal honesty with an external guard being left up. The guard though, is not to save herself pain, but to save pain from her new love. One that she wants to have so badly that she hides things. Like that ache in her heart from a previous relationship or that bad habit that she knows he won’t understand. That little bit of herself she can’t give him because she still doesn’t have it back.
Because love, real love, the kind that “Smoke” talks about is messy and anything worth your time is worth your whole true self. And that is the story that Faren get’s to tell in what we think is her finest single to date.
It’s real. It’s honest. It’s Country music in it’s best form.
Thank you Faren and thank you to Nicollete, Jake, Hailey and Grady for giving this track to the world. We think it is a better place with it.
Follow Faren on Instagram and Facebook and get yourself in her fan club over there THE FANNY PACK. She is a true gem.