I’ll be honest. When I first saw the title “Single of the Year” and read that it was from a young, Nashville-based artist with pop-country polish, I sighed loud enough to scare my dog. As someone who still thinks George Strait never missed and mutters “they don’t make ‘em like they used to” at least once a week, I wasn’t exactly eager to dive into another glittery, modern country tune with a cheeky title.
But here’s the kicker: Maddye Trew’s song? It’s actually good. Like, really good.
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“Single of the Year” starts with a line that should’ve had me rolling my eyes—“At this point a breakup would be catchin’ a break”—but instead, I cracked a smile. Then came “I can’t seem to make it to my first second date,” and now I was nodding. Dang it. The girl can write.
The whole track walks this razor-thin line between heartbreak and humor, and Trew doesn’t just balance it—she dances on it. There’s no whining here, no self-pity. It’s a song about being unlucky in love, sure, but it’s told with such cleverness and self-awareness that you almost want to raise a beer with her and toast the bad luck.
The chorus, “All my friends are tying the knot / and I’m over here just tying one on,” lands like a one-liner you’d expect from an artist twice her age. It’s both funny and painfully true for anyone who’s felt like the last single person standing. She somehow manages to make loneliness sound like a party, or at least something you can laugh about while sipping a PBR.
Musically, it’s not trying to reinvent the wheel—and thank God for that. It’s got that clean, modern production that’s become the norm in Nashville, but it doesn’t drown in overprocessed gloss. There’s enough organic instrumentation to keep my foot tapping, and her voice? Clear, expressive, and just the right amount of twang. You believe her. That counts for a lot.
I’ve heard too many songs lately that feel like country music wearing a pop mask. This isn’t that. Trew knows her way around a country lyric, and she leans into the genre’s roots, even while winking at its clichés. She’s not trying to be Loretta Lynn, but she’s definitely got that same spunky, tell-it-like-it-is spirit. And that’s more than I can say for half the stuff at the top of the charts.
By the time the bridge hits—“This is one award I wasn’t expectin’ / To tell you the truth, I don’t wanna accept it”—I was fully converted. It’s a moment of vulnerability that grounds the song without derailing the fun. Trew might be young, but she writes like someone who’s paid attention. She’s got stories to tell, and more importantly, the voice to tell them.
So yeah, call me surprised. “Single of the Year” might not be what I expected, but it’s a dang fine piece of country songwriting. Maddye Trew? I’ll be keeping an eye on her—reluctantly at first, but now with real interest.
Claire Uebelacker