Released: 2020
Luke Combs’ ‘Cold As You’ is a heart-wrenching tale of a man nursing his heartbreak in a run-down bar. The song captures the raw emotions of a broken heart, using the bar’s setting and the cold beer as metaphors for the singer’s feelings of loneliness and despair.
The song opens with a vivid description of a ‘junked out joint off a backroad,’ a bar that’s seen better days. The ‘toolbox trucks’ making their way home symbolize the working-class patrons who frequent the bar. When Combs sings ‘When guys like me lose girls like you, That’s where we run to,’ he’s talking about how the bar serves as a refuge for heartbroken men like him.
‘Whiskey River’ on the jukebox refers to the classic country song by Willie Nelson, setting the mood for the bar. The ‘honky tonk sawdust dance floor’ is a typical feature of old country bars, and the ‘neon, five o’clock, broke clock’ symbolizes the timeless nature of the bar, where patrons can forget their worries. The ‘beer almost as cold as you’ is a clever play on words, comparing the coldness of the beer to the coldness of the woman who broke his heart.
The ‘good time numbers on the stall door’ are probably phone numbers left by previous patrons, suggesting the bar’s seedy atmosphere. The ‘picture of you on the dart board’ is a clear sign of the singer’s bitterness towards his ex-lover. The ‘cinder block walls’ that ‘ain’t ever been clean’ reflect the grimy, gritty nature of the bar, but the singer feels it’s still not as dirty as how his ex treated him.
The chorus repeats throughout the song, reinforcing the singer’s heartbreak and his attempts to drown his sorrows. The bar, with its ‘Whiskey River’ on the jukebox, ‘honky tonk sawdust dance floor,’ and ‘neon, five o’clock, broke clock,’ remains a constant, just like his pain. The beer, ‘almost as cold as you,’ continues to serve as a stark reminder of his cold-hearted ex.
