Monday April 17, 2023,
The Australian country-folk musician Charlie Powling has released his much-anticipated track, Drive The Highway. The new song is a mix of enticing narrative, spirited performances and a sound that satisfies our expectations of the genre. In a decade, Charlie Powling has distinguished himself with a series of well-received releases and live shows on the Darwin music circuit, culminating in a memorable highlight of the prestigious 2019 Darwin Festival. With his self-titled debut album, Charlie revealed a stirring amalgamation of folk, country and rock.
With his experience being raised in a politically active family, Charlie took inspiration from various sources, including Australian folk music, American civil rights artists and music legends such as The Beatles, Neil Young, Pete Seeger and Leonard Cohen. Drive The Highway relies on some key ingredients to make its mark, most notably, a lyric that traverses the line between confessional and love song, utilising a first-person point of view to hit home, as well as a musical landscape whose organic textures and style, reinforces the lyric’s focus. Charlie explains his inspiration, ‘My experiences of hard times, mostly caused through wrong choices, some just bad luck, have influenced my desire to write songs about hard times. Most of my songs are written from my own life experiences and people I have known.’
The new track begins with voice and guitar, slowly expanding via varying playing techniques, rhythm changes and an overall sense of increased energy and intensity. Charlie has said about what lies behind Drive The Highway, ‘It’s a song about the fleeting nature of young love and our pursuit of living in the moment, embracing life’s pleasures, and moving beyond past troubles to explore new horizons.’ Down The Highway unfolds in the same way, any persuasive narrative does, using an inviting opening image such as, ‘Remember when we were young / Down the beach laughing in the sun’ to the song’s concluding line, ‘I feel this hot rod purr and thunder / I might drive forever tonight,’ leaving the listener with a lasting sense of connection to the track.
