Maddie Marlow and Taylor Dye never intended to hit a nerve when they sat down on St. Patricks Day and wrote “Girl In A Country Song.” Merely expressing their own reaction to the reductive tilt of today’s BroCountry, the pair and co-writer Aaron Schwerz shamelessly skewered its Xeroxed stereotypes; “Girl” was as much a lark as it was ever “meaningful social commentary.”
Yet the response was so instant and intense, there was no denying it. NPR’s “All Things Considered” cited Maddie & Tae for “turning heads in different ways with their very first single,” Rolling Stone cited them as one of “10 New Artists You Need to Know” and David Letterman couldn’t get the plucky duo to New York fast enough. Even elevated cultural think-tank The Atlantic marveled, “Cheekily appropriating much of the sound of modern country, the two young women directly quote well-known bro-country lyrics and titles…”
No one was more surprised than the natives of Sugar Land, Texas and Ada, Oklahoma. Still in the studio tracking overdubs for “Girl,” they signed their record deal before Dan Huff had even finished four sides on the sunshine’n’moxie pair.
“We wanted to go at it from a girl’s perspective, and we wanted to put ourselves in the shoes of this girl,” says Dye. “You know, how does she feel wearing those cut-off shorts, sitting on the tailgate?”
“Boys, we love you, we want to look good, but it’s not all we’re good for,” Marlow cautions with a laugh. “We are girls with something to say. We were brought up to know how we should be treated.”
Simple as that. But there’s so much more to Maddie & Tae than the song that is either a feminist declaration, an echo of Janet Jackson’s rebuke “I’ve got a name, and it ain’t ‘Baby’,” or this year’s feel-good finger-wag to dumb boys. NPR’s lead pop critic Ann Powers agrees, “Maddie and Tae are more. They’re songwriters, powerful harmonizers, and in the video for ‘Girl In A Country Song,’ natural comediennes.”
One listen to their self-titled EP shows that. The reeling mean-girl send-up “Sierra,” with its bending steel and trotting acoustic guitar, boasts harmonies that turn in on each other and the kind of truth that’s hilarious and straight-up.
“There was this beauty-queen bully from high school who sent my friends and I home in tears plenty of times,” Marlow explains. “In order to get over it, I had to write a song. So I brought the idea of ‘Sierra,’ and started singing, ‘I wish I had something nice to say…’
“Tae and our co-writer Aaron Scherz lit up and ran with it.”
Any one who’s suffered through and survived high school can relate. But the ability to rhyme “Sierra, Sierra, life ain’t all tiaras…” and taking the rejoinder “you’re gonna find out karma’s a…” to the brink is what sets these two late teenagers apart.
Effervescent and savoring every moment, Maddie & Tae laugh when they lean into the cautionary “That high horse you’re riding… can buck you off clean,” then let their harmonies swoop free and high on the outro.
Like a lot of young women, Maddie & Tae grew up on the Dixie Chicks’ full-tilt acoustica. Both dreamers who knew what they wanted early, the pair met at 15 through their vocal coach and came to Nashville for “a summer camp publishing deal.” They met Big Machine’s SVP of A&R Allison Jones – and fate stepped in.
As Tae recalls, “She said, ‘If you really want to pursue this, you will need to move to Nashville.’ I knew that was what I wanted, but moving to Nashville also meant I had to figure out how to graduate from high school early, and Maddie had to turn down college.”
In 2013, it was decided. The pair relocated – and never looked back. Publishing deal in hand, they were immersed in creativity, seeking a voice that was both authentic and truly their own. Like Taylor Swift, the duo knew by speaking their truth, their uniqueness would set them apart.
As Marlow told Rolling Stone Country, “Our whole project revolves around keeping it real and being honest. We didn’t filter anything, because we felt like when it comes from an honest place, the truth will resonate so much better. The thing about Taylor, everything is real and relevant to what she’s going through, and that’s why people connect with her.”
Listening to the double harmonies over an acoustic guitar hope-strung-over-doubt mid-tempo “Fly,” Maddie & Tae’s conviction is evident. Will what’s been built be betrayed? How do you keep the faith when you’re so unsure? Where is the courage to maintain your place when you’re afraid of the outcome?
Not since “Wide Open Spaces” has an act embraced the will to grow so unabashedly. In perfect synchronization, Maddie & Tae sing, “Keep on climbing, though the ground might shake, keep on reaching through the limb might break/ we’ve come this far, don’t be scared now ‘Cause you can learn to fly on the way down…”
It’s the sort of song that empowers people wherever they are in life, whatever challenge they may be encountering. Yes, it is about coming of age, but it’s also facing the things that scare you – and having the faith to transcend.
“’Fly’ hits home every time we listen to it,” Dye offers. “We really wanted to write a song that was, ‘You may not have anything figured out, but it doesn’t matter.’”
Indeed. Townes Van Zant wrote, “To live is to fly…” For Maddie & Tae, their wings are in the music. What they feel, how they live, what they dream – this is where they rise. One need only listen to the tumbledown hoedown “Your Side of Town,” that’s all high jinx and higher spirits as the pair warn off a no-good man for the last time, to understand.
Even in the hardcore throw-down, all bucking backbeat and bee-sting guitar, there is a romp and a plucky audacity that shows these young ladies have no interest in letting anything break their spirits. Just as importantly, they fear no fiddles, no banjos, no steel guitars, even as they have bulked up drums that crash and guitars that slash and sting like the big boys.
While Rolling Stone observed, “Cheekily appropriating much of the sound of modern country,” there is so much more to Maddie & Tae than that. Independent thinkers, strong livers, hardcore dreamers, the pair are reaching for the sky – and winking at us all while they do it.
Sometimes, it’s the freshest faces and brightest sounds that pull us in. For Maddie & Tae, who embrace real country, it’s that merge of what’s right now and what they love that sets them apart/captures our imaginations in the best possible way.
Tourist In This Town
Maddie & Tae Lyrics
Jump to: Overall Meaning ↴ Line by Line Meaning ↴
I have to find another Friday night spot
'Cause if I see somebody, I'd have to talk
And I got nothing to say, nothing to say
It's not like I forgot places we went
But now the monument's still what I thought it meant
So I've been starting over ever since
We went our separate ways
Now I'm a tourist in this town
So where do I go from here?
A tourist in this town
A broken heart for a souvenir
Lookin' in windows I don't recognize
Like I ain't been living here for my whole life
Walking the tears away, wasting the night
Nothing better to do 'cause it all looks like you
I'm a tourist in this town
So where do I go from here?
A tourist in this town
A broken heart for a souvenir
Once was found but now I'm lost
Don't even know the name of that street I crossed
I'm a tourist in this town
So where do I go from here?
You turn my home into a city on a map
I'm okay alone but the thing that makes me mad
Is I feel like a stranger, like the only thing I am
Is a tourist in this town
So where do I go from here?
A tourist in this town
A broken heart for a souvenir
Once was found but now I'm lost
Don't even know the name of that street I crossed
I'm a tourist in this town
So where do I go from here?
A broken heart for a souvenir
So where do I go from here?
In the song "Tourist in This Town" by Maddie & Tae, the singer is struggling with the aftermath of a breakup. She feels like an outsider in the town where she and her former partner shared memories and experiences. The familiar places she used to frequent now hold painful memories, and she struggles to find new spots where she doesn't feel haunted by the past. She's lost her sense of belonging and feels like a stranger in her own town.
Throughout the song, the singer reflects on her feelings of displacement and confusion. She describes aimlessly wandering through the streets, looking in windows she doesn't recognize and feeling lost. She's having trouble moving on and is stuck in a cycle of reliving the past, unable to chart a path forward. The song ends with an open-ended question; the singer is left wondering where she should go from here.
The lyrics to "Tourist in This Town" express a relatable feeling of post-breakup disorientation. The song captures the experience of feeling like a stranger in a place that used to be home. It's a poignant reflection on the sometimes-painful process of moving on.
Line by Line Meaning
I have to find myself a new coffee shop
I need to find a new place to go to feel comfortable and not be reminded of our past
I have to find another Friday night spot
I need to find a new place to occupy my time and not be reminded of our past traditions
'Cause if I see somebody, I'd have to talk
I don't want to run into anyone that knows both of us and be forced to discuss our separation
And I got nothing to say, nothing to say
I have nothing to say about how I feel about our separation and don't want to discuss it
It's not like I forgot places we went
I haven't forgotten about the places we used to go together
But now the monument's still what I thought it meant
Even though we used to share a special moment at a certain place, it now holds a different meaning for me
So I've been starting over ever since
Since our separation, I've been figuring out where to go and what to do to make me feel ok again
We went our separate ways
We parted and now have separate lives
Now I'm a tourist in this town
I'm revisiting the places we used to go to, but it feels like I'm seeing them for the first time
So where do I go from here?
I don't know what direction to take with my life from here
A broken heart for a souvenir
The only thing that I have left from our relationship is a broken heart
Lookin' in windows I don't recognize
I'm looking at places we used to go to that have now changed, and it makes me feel lost
Like I ain't been living here for my whole life
Even though I've lived here forever, it now all feels unfamiliar to me
Walking the tears away, wasting the night
I'm walking around my town trying to distract myself from the pain, but it's not really helping
Nothing better to do 'cause it all looks like you
I can't seem to escape the memory of you in this town, everything reminds me of you
Once was found but now I'm lost
I used to know my way around this town, but now I feel lost and out of place
Don't even know the name of that street I crossed
I'm so disoriented that I'm not even sure where I am or what street I'm on
You turn my home into a city on a map
You transformed the place where I live and feel comfortable into an unknown and foreign place
I'm okay alone but the thing that makes me mad
I'm fine being alone, but I'm angry that I now feel like a stranger in my own hometown
Is I feel like a stranger, like the only thing I am
I don't feel like myself anymore, and all I can identify with is my broken heart and feeling lost in my own town
A broken heart for a souvenir
The only thing that I have left from our relationship is a broken heart
So where do I go from here?
I don't know how to move forward from here
Lyrics © Warner Chappell Music, Inc.
Written by: Barry George Dean, Jimmy Robbins, Maddie Marlow, Taylor Elizabeth Dye
Lyrics Licensed & Provided by LyricFind
@ericamcknew1178
"Tourist In This Town"
I had to find myself a new coffee shop
I had to find another Friday night spot
'Cause if I see somebody I'd have to talk
And I got nothing to say, nothing to say
It's not like I forgot places we went
But now the monument's still what I thought it meant
So I've been starting over ever since
We went our separate ways
Now I'm a tourist in this town
So where do I go from here?
Tourist in this town
A broken heart for a souvenir
Looking in windows I don't recognize
Like I ain't been living here for my whole life
Walking the tears away, wasting the night
Nothing better to do 'cause it all looks like you
I'm a tourist in this town
So where do I go from here?
A tourist in this town
A broken heart for a souvenir
Once was found but now I'm lost
Don't even know the name
Of that street I crossed
I'm a tourist in this town
So where do I go from here?
You turn my home into a city on a map
I'm okay alone but the thing that makes me mad
Is I feel like a stranger
Like the only thing I am
Is a tourist in this town
So where do I go from here?
A tourist in this town
A broken heart for a souvenir
Once was found but now I'm lost
Don't even know the name
Of that street I crossed
I'm a tourist in this town
So where do I go from here?
A broken heart for a souvenir
So where do I go from here?
@hwwawomenswrestling5947
I had to find myself a new coffee shop
I had to find another Friday night spot
'Cause if I see somebody I'd have to talk
And I got nothing to say, nothing to say
It's not like I forgot places we went
But now the monument's still what I thought it meant
So I've been starting over ever since
We went our separate ways
Now I'm a tourist in this town
So where do I go from here?
Tourist in this town
A broken heart for a souvenir
Looking in windows I don't recognize
Like I ain't been living here for my whole life
Walking the tears away, wasting the night
Nothing better to do 'cause it all looks like you
I'm a tourist in this town
So where do I go from here?
A tourist in this town
A broken heart for a souvenir
Once was found but now I'm lost
Don't even know the name
Of that street I crossed
I'm a tourist in this town
So where do I go from here?
You turn my home into a city on a map
I'm okay alone but the thing that makes me mad
Is I feel like a stranger
Like the only thing I am
Is a tourist in this town
So where do I go from here?
A tourist in this town
A broken heart for a souvenir
Once was found but now I'm lost
Don't even know the name
Of that street I crossed
I'm a tourist in this town
So where do I go from here?
A broken heart for a souvenir
So where do I go from here?
Source: Musixmatch
@kanompia
The best of the best from Maddie & Tae, I've been listening to this more than a hundred times. Never get enough
@haileyedwards5824
It's nice to hear more of Tae's vocals in this!
@a_few_pointers
I always wondered why she doesn't ever sing lead! I love them both!
@sarahdavis1033
Y’all bring a fresh traditional sound to today’s country; I love it 😍
@chocolatenoodles7917
Listened for 10 seconds and already hit 'like'...
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That's how sure I am when it comes to Maddie and Tae's songs ❤
@KeithOconnor
Whoever says they're not country...needs to get their ears checked.
@sleepysncring
Keith O'Connor honestly, i'm not country, but i love these girls. idk, i listen to billie eilish and tate mcrae, and i hate country music. but these girls... they're amazing.
@joshchavez5039
another great song this new album sounds like it will be amazing
@barbarakeeney6203
Finally a song I can fully relate to! Yes! It’s beautiful. I wish I could leave my home town😔
@saloniarjun9353
I have to move from one city to another, this song is really relatable especially the line"A broken heart for a souvenir "