When I Write The Song (Big Loud Texas, 2025)

Why do reviewers call an artist's second album their sophomore release, but you never see anyone calling someone's third or fourth record their junior or senior album? If you're going to use high school analogies, you shouldn't be allowed to skip a grade, should you?

That's just one of many questions arising from listening to Jake Worthington's, well, the follow-up to his freshman CD. Worthington had a hand in co-writing most of the songs here, but the only track he wrote all on his own is the title track, which is not one of those "I believe in music" upbeat anthems. It's not even about the difficulties involved in being an honest artist. It's actually 3 minutes and 57 seconds of self pity ("The best part of me's grown out on my baby brother / The worst part of me comes out when I write the song) that is as vague – it's never disclosed what awful part of him comes out when he writes the songs – as it is contradictory ("My life before music's a life I can't remember / My life before picking's a life I often recall") Maybe the worst part of him is inconcongruity.

Why was this chosen as the album title when it is not indicative of Worthington's persona or the rest of this CD? Far from the whiny party-pooper vibe of that song, the sense of fun is palpable on tracks like "Two First Names" and "I'm the One" (featuring Marty Stuart), the latter reveling in some of that '90s era tongue-twisting lyrics ("If she's looking for a true blue, dirt road charmer / A blue blooded, mean business, knight in shining armor") even if – another question – wouldn't 'red-blooded' make more sense here? There aren't many blue bloods on dirt roads.

Worthington is a neotraditionalist, so no cold beer and hot babes bro country tracks. Instead we get the western swing toe-tapper "My Home's in Oklahoma.", some good old-fashioned wordplay on "Too Much to Think" and, of course, some hard drinking songs, like "Drowning in Whiskey." Miranda Lambert helps out on "Hello Shitty Day," which is somewhat reminiscent of the Faron Young classic "Hello, Walls" ("Hello shitty day (hello, hello) / Glad you came my way") although it's unclear exactly why he would be glad about "all of this pain and all of this rain."

Worthington overreaches somewhat on the closing track "I Still Believe in Miracles" comparing meeting his wife to Jesus restoring sight to the blind and turning water into wine, and it is a credit to the sincerity in his voice that he almost nails it.

The lead single "It Ain't the Whiskey" is a standout that makes excellent use of humor, as a guy tries to convince a cop his erratic driving and inability to perform field sobriety tests are due not to alcohol consumption, but to the distracting presence of his female companion. The officer is naturally skeptical until he sees her for himself. And "Not Like I Used To" really captures the sense of disillusionment after a brutal breakup.

Maybe in this instance when they call this Worthington's sophomore record, they mean it in the classic literary sense. The word sophomore comes from two Greek words and means "wise fool." Considering this album's moments of brilliance and its, well, less luminous moments, it makes more sense.