Judd Wasserman’s “Cross That Line” (co-written with Trevor Ridge) and “Here With You” are accessible country songs for those of us foreign to the country genre. Through thoughtful overlays of instrumentation and poignant lyricism illustrating the toils of intimacy, Wasserman rebrands a western-style serenade, using tools from his more familiar singer-songwriter spirit. These songs are touching summer ditties for anyone paddling against the emotional undertows of heartbreak and painful nostalgia.
Wasserman employs a standard set of instruments but uses nuanced play between them to highlight particular sentiments throughout both tracks. A bubbling flock of light guitar and piano fills whimsically smears the urban backdrop of the Seattle singer-songwriter in “Cross That Line.” These trills, on top of the song’s driving and upbeat tempo, create a sizzling tension of nervous anticipation.
The lyrics in “Cross That Line” produce an aura of uncertainty that blurs the intimate details between the singer and their muse. Starting with the line “okay sure / let’s say I go back to your apartment,” a sense of ambivalent hesitancy reveals itself. Doubt immediately prefaces the connotative thumbs-up of heading back to someone’s apartment, as if there’s both something to want and something to fear.
The story feels as much a confidential conversation with a past love as it does within the singer’s own mind. The first verse briskly zips from relationship start to finish — the brevity of a bee buzzing by, the emotional weight of an anvil — before crossing the namesake line. The pre-choruses lean into the loneliness felt by both sides, followed by choruses of ambiguous efforts to return to the line.
The song ends on the same skeptical line it begins with, calling to that ambivalent hesitancy once again. This repeated indecisiveness hits the splitting feeling of being lost and found, being in love and in collapse, wanting anything else and only the person in front of you. “Cross That Line” captures the inability to see the big picture around you when you’re tangled by the emotional vines within it.
Instrumentally, “Here With You” situates in an oppositely rural scene, as if it were recorded porch-side on a lazy, dusty afternoon in the Wild West. The interplay of the same carefree frills over a drawling cadence feels fluid and jammy, like the song started and, in real time, new people grabbed instruments and plugged into the scene.
The lyrics in “Here With You” tune into simple yet visceral feelings that make the song effortlessly relatable. They serve not only to paint a moving picture but also an internal dialogue as the verse and chorus volley between “the bad times” and “the good times.” The first verse begins describing blanket throws of misunderstanding: “how could I’ve been so blind / how could I’ve been so wrong / I thought you left me far behind / you were with me all along.”
As the listener feels a charging of romantic wrongdoings, the chorus breaks the ruminations with the line “ooh baby / you know I want you all the time,” and the wall of anger dissolves into mush and tears. The tender feelings mixed with the quaint, unapologetic vibe of the song rang a country bell inside me. Wasserman’s voice carries a hint of yearning, which pulled me in opposing directions. Some listens through the song felt like the isolation of choosing something that didn’t choose you back; others felt like the gentle, apologizing serenade at the end of a tumultuous episode between two sweethearts.
If you find yourself listening to the tracks and want to hear or know more, catch Wasserman playing in his band, Loose Cannons, on September 12th at Tractor Tavern. They share the bill with Dodgy Mountain Men and Garrett & The Sheriffs.
Cross That Line/Here With You
I am a mother and this helped me!