Listen to Charli Adams’ bittersweet “Cloverland Drive”
A country-rock ballad that celebrates the end of youth.
Alabama-born, Tennessee-based songwriter and musician Charli Adams makes modern pop-rock that looks at youth through rose-colored glasses. Her forthcoming debut EP, Good At Being Young, takes place in the backseats of friends’ cars and at late-night parties, and explores the lasting impact of youthful hedonism and friendship with the kind of surgical precision that only hindsight can engender.
Today, The FADER is premiering “Cloverland Drive,” a spare and bittersweet country-rock ballad that both celebrates and mourns the final moments of one’s teen years. Of the song, Adams tells The FADER via email:
“’Cloverland Drive’ is the name of the cross street I've lived off of ever since I moved to Nashville on my own at 17. I wanted the song to be an ode to the Nashville music scene that I grew up with, and my house that we all called home. It’s a special place and we all joke that I’m not allowed to move out at this point. The verses come from a phone conversation I had with a friend looking back at that era...The brief period where the invincibility of youth and the freedom of early adulthood overlap before reality quickly sets in. In the second verse I write “Cloverland Drive was one hell of a time, fireworks inside” which is what happened one night when I invited everyone over after playing a club called "The Local", and we lit sparklers and Roman candles in my kitchen.
The song was written after the rest of the EP was recorded, as a kind of reflection on the EP itself and the era it represented. I hope it reminds people of their long lost friend, teenage drives, house parties and the way it feels to be young. Immediately after writing it I knew it had to be the closing statement of “Good At Being Young” and I've actually just finished recording a sort of sequel to it called "Remember Cloverland" that will be on my next release."