American music has a long history of using songs to tell a story. Woody Guthrie, Jimmie Rodgers, Bob Dylan, and countless others have written and recorded songs that spin a tale. Even the simplest of stories can feel epic and important by simply setting them to music.
Jake Owen's "Eight Second Ride" is a shameful desecration of that proud tradition.
Let's consider the narrative of this story for a moment. A woman walks into a bar. Owens (likely in a half-drunken haze) feels like he recognizes said woman. He asks her whether she fits into category A (Are you alone?) or category B (Are you with someone?) and she answers ambiguously (No, I'm not), which is apparently Owens cue to show her to his motor vehicle that is equipped with unnecessarily large tires on it. The woman is (of course) sexually aroused at the site of so much rubber, and agrees to get in the vehicle with the intoxicated man. After warning her to be careful of his spit cup (ACK!), he informs her that riding with him will be more exciting than riding a bull in a rodeo (a bullrider is expected to stay on the bull for at least eight seconds, lest they be penalized in that horrible, barbaric, incredibly stupid "sport"). This of course leads to them making the beast with two backs in the bed of his truck. THE END.
"Mind-numbingly insipid" doesn't even come close to describing the intelligence level of this song.
I'd also like to point out that, although Owens claims that a "true country boy's hard to find", I think he might be mistaken. According to the 2000 U.S. Census, about twenty percent of the American population lives in rural areas. While that is not a huge number, that still means that one in five Americans could, in fact, consider themselves a "true country boy" (or girl).
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