Blue Ain't Your Color

Gotta Love Kiwis

Blue Ain't Your Color by Keith Urban

Brought to My Attention by Kim C.

I never understood how this New Zealand-born Australian ended up singing country music, but you can hear that he's got a knack for it. The first place he moved to in the U.S. was Nashville, so...(x)

This track was actually written by Steven Lee Olsen, Hillary Lindsey and Clint Lagerberg. Urban chose the track because he fell in love with "the lyric...the melody, the feel" (x), but he managed to get his fingerprints on it.

I didn't want it to feel like a waltz, you know? So, when we recorded the song at Starstruck Studios here in Nashville, we kept it a little more robotic sounding, so it wasn't a straight band. It was a little more machinery, rhythmically, and I think it kept, hopefully for me at least, it kept it in a unique place that allowed the story to have a lot of space. (source)

It was a "waltz with a doo-wop feel" that Urban tailored to fit the "minimalist vocal that [he] wanted to feature" (x).

Just for clarification, it's not really a waltz, right? It's in common time; they've just subdivided each of the four beats per measure into three counts.

But anyway, those triplets still give it a waltzy vibe, and the lyrics are certainly romantic enough to warrant the label. Whether it's a true waltz or not, it's certainly worthy of a late-night slow dance at your favorite locale.

It seemed counter-intuitive to me that Urban was going for simplicity and decided the best way to achieve this sound was through something "more robotic sounding," but I think it works. The instrumentals bounce softly behind a heartfelt performance by Urban, referring to both his vocals and his immense talent on the guitar (listen to him go after the second repetition of the chorus).

I must say it's a bit presumptuous to see a girl alone at the bar and assume chances are you're sittin' here in this bar 'cause he ain't gonna treat you right, and it's much more so to go over and tell her she ought to leave this imagined guy...

...But Urban croons about how he's not tryna be another "just pick you up" kinda guy, and you can't help but believe him.

He admits it's not his place, but maybe after being successfully married for a decade, he feels qualified to offer a word of advice to this struggling young woman. I, for one, would be receptive to anything Keith Urban wants to tell me, as long as he sings it like this.

And let me tell you, anyone would leave the bar feeling better after hearing this honeyed tune.

This is such a wholesome track, and I'm happy someone's out here performing country music like this.

Overview:

Genre:
Country

Favorite Lyrics:
But I just don't understand how another man
could take your sun and turn it ice cold.

Verdict:
comforting; kind of an "oldies" vibe;
sounds weirdly like a country Bruno Mars