Sometimes you pack your bags, head off in search of something bigger and discover that the grass isn’t particularly greener on the other side… Caleb Lee Hutchinson knows a thing or two about that feeling, and his new single in the lead up to his new album, turns a failed adventure out west into a wonderfully down-on-his-luck country story.
The song follows Caleb as he heads towards California hoping to make something of himself, only to find that things haven’t exactly worked out. Before long, he’s standing on the roadside with his thumb in the air, trying to hitch a ride back home. Except there’s one small problem: by the time he reaches Las Vegas, he’s beginning to wonder whether he has a home to return to at all.
There’s something particularly charming about the way Caleb approaches failure, as rather than turning every disappointment into an inspirational lesson about perseverance, he seems perfectly happy to admit that sometimes life makes you look like a bit of an idiot. “I’m proud of what I’ve done before, when I was just 18 years old,” Caleb says about the release of his song. “But I also know that’s not all I have to contribute to the world. With that song, I wanted to take ownership of my story and also tell some very funny, very true tales.”
“Thumbs Up” might be about a journey that doesn’t go according to plan, but sometimes the best country songs come from getting completely lost along the way.
