Format Digital download Label Arista Nashville | Genre Country | |
Released September 1, 2014 (2014-09-01) Length 3:55 (album version)
3:30 (single edit) Writer(s) Brad Paisley
Lee Thomas Miller | ||
"Perfect Storm" is a song recorded by American country music artist Brad Paisley. It was released on September 1, 2014 by Arista Nashville as the second single from his tenth studio album, Moonshine in the Trunk. He co-wrote the song with Lee Thomas Miller and co-produced it with Luke Wooten.
Contents
Composition
The song is a love ballad musically driven mainly by electric guitar and also featuring a prominent steel guitar, fiddle and a synthesizer. Paisley said he wanted the guitar part to sound like thunder. Lyrically, the singer describes the girl he loves as a "perfect storm."
Critical reception
Deborah Evans Price of Billboard said Perfect Storm is "one of those love songs that says what women want to hear and what men wish they could say" and added that "it's a tender ballad [...] and it's got the word "hit" written all over it".
Taste Of Country gave the single a favorable review, stating that "Paisley’s stellar guitar skills are on full display here, creating a storm of powerful riffs all their own" and the song is just "as complex and beautiful as the girl Paisley is singing about".
Giving the song four and a half stars out of five, Dan Devour of Music Trespass said "the song is about that perfect girl that you can meet and fall in love with suddenly." He also states that its lyrics "show that Brad must have been in love recently."
Music video
The music video was directed by Jim Shea and premiered in October 2014. In it, Paisley and his band play the song in the pouring rain while wind throws photos of Paisley's female fans all around them.
Chart performance
The song was first released on August 5 as a promotional single and charted at number 45 on the Hot Country Songs chart. After its release as an official single, the song debuted at #52 on the Country Airplay chart. It also re-entered the Hot Country songs chart at #42. "Perfect Storm" peaked at #4 on the Hot Country Songs chart, Paisley's highest peaking single on that chart since the methodology of ranking the songs was changed in 2012. It brought his total of Top 10 hits to 32. The song was also Paisley's first single to hit #1 on Billboard's Canada Country chart. This song became Paisley's first single to hit the number one spot on the Country Airplay chart since "Remind Me" in 2011. The song has sold 357,000 copies in the U.S. as of February 2015.