The Singles Bar: Jackie Lee unravels one brutally ‘Long Year’

Welcome to The Singles Bar, a review series focused on new single and song releases.

Death is something you can never be ready for. It’s swift and brutal, and you’re never the same again. You can pray; you can cry; you can shake your fits in anger. Nothing changes the course of our human existence. It’s a hard-to-swallow kind of knee-sore truth, but that doesn’t soothe the pain we feel, tearing through our bones like an earthquake’s seismic waves. Almost two years ago now, singer-songwriter Jackie Lee was hit with what would have been classified as a ruthless 9.6 quake on the Richter scale. His mother passed away from ovarian cancer. But that was just the beginning.

“I didn’t even know if I wanted to be in the music business anymore. It wasn’t just music, either — I couldn’t find the importance in everything,” he speaks candidly to Billboard about his journey and a new emotionally-eviscerating piano ballad “Long Year,” decorated with the most honest vocal performance of his career. “Never in my life had anything completely rocked my world, and that did. And I was just trying to figure out how to respond to it.”

He continues, “But I kept going. I just knew my mom wouldn’t have accepted anything other than me following my dreams. At that point, I wanted to make her proud and show her how tough I could be. My dad also gave me encouragement and said, ‘You can’t let this destroy you.'”

In the coming months, other things in his life flew off the hinges: he ended his long-term relationship with his girlfriend, left his record label (Broken Bow) and was diagnosed with stage II testicular cancer. He mustered up the strength to push forward, and by all accounts, his optimism paid off for awhile. He had surgery to remove the lump, and all seemed to be well with his soul. Months later, it returned, and Lee was tested in a way that would have completely broken many other people. But he survived. In the music video accompanying “Long Year,” he depicts his journey through chemotherapy, allowing himself to be stunningly vulnerable, raw and honest about his struggle.

“I’ve been to hell and back,” he sings over searing ivory. His vocal is creamy but splinters and cracks when the emotion gets too overwhelming. He holds it together, as is often his way, displaying just enough distress to hook you in and rip out your veins. “I wake up haunted, like I saw your ghost / Time was racing until you let go / Now, it moves so slow,” he brandishes his heart, each throb wavering on his tongue. He then calls out to a higher power, wailing, “And if time’s the only thing that’s gonna heal this pain, then why’s God stretching seconds and the minutes into days?” He strips away the drum loops and the cash grabs at a clear-cut radio hit for sincerity, permitting himself to ditch the flash for substance. Admittedly, I had all but written him off as bro-country-lite, but he hits a home run here. “Long Year” is one of the year’s best songs, across all genres.

And you might wanna grab the whole tissue aisle at Target for this one, folks.

Listen below:

Photo Credit: Rob Norris

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