On October 15, 2013, I got together with Trevor Rosen and Matt Ramsey from Old Dominion to write a song.
I’d written with Trevor dozens of times, but this was the first time I’d written with Matt as well.
Things were really starting to percolate for those guys, I was lucky that they had an open day where we could get together and try to write a song.
We met at Matt’s place.
Like always, you just start strumming some chords and at some point, someone will start singing something,
Anything.
Yet nothing in particular.
I dove in and, out of the blue, sang…
“So you wanna go dance in the rain,
I’ll find us a cloud.
Or maybe somewhere they don’t know your name,
I’ll find us a crowd”
And with that, we were off and running.
I’m not sure I had much else to do with the song.
Matt and Trevor did all the heavy lifting.
It was a sight to see.
I remember when Trevor sang the part,
“As blue as all get out
Maybe we should get out of… here I am waiting on you to give me the green light…”
The way the word “here” finishes one line and starts the next, completely bowled me over.
I remember thinking, “There’s no way, in a million years, that I would have EVER come up with that! Wow!”
When we got the chorus…
“We’ll get high, or we’ll lay low.
We’ll make up what we don’t know…”
I couldn’t believe how well it launched the song.
When Trevor sang “And if your Sundae needs a cherry…”
Matt responded with “I’m your Huckleberry”…
I was gobsmacked.
I got home that night and played it for Jenny.
She loved it.
But for some reason, I knew the song wouldn’t work with the overall vibe of “Born By The Radio”, so it sat on the shelf and fermented.
It was worth the wait.
Mike Plume
February 10, 2020