Throwback Thursday: Maggie Rose, ‘Looking Back Now’

Welcome to Throwback Thursday, a weekly series showcasing an album, single, music video or performance of a bygone era and its personal and/or cultural significance.

In the age of the #MeToo movement, Maggie Rose‘s “Looking Back Now” feels very much a precursor to the liberation of women from the clutches of a sexist and harrowingly abusive system of locked doors, rape and passive spectators. Released in 2013 as the third and final single off her excellent debut album, Cut to Impress, the swampy pop-country story sharpens its cracked teeth on a twisted tale of abuse, revenge and what’s right or wrong. The narrator, who learns of one abuser’s actions on another woman, looks down the barrel of a 38 and pulls the trigger. Then, once incarcerated, a warden gets sweet on her, and she is faced with another decision to survive. Rose’s leading woman displays true bravery, taking the situation into her own hands. She refuses to play victim.

“I chose to cut that song and put it on the EP because I thought it’s such a wonderfully-told, wonderfully-written story. It was the most vivid narrative put into a song that I’ve ever heard,” Rose told Song Facts many years ago ⎯⎯ then going by her real name. “Looking Back Now,” originally called “Whiskey and a Gun,” was written by Lisa Carver, who recorded a smokier and raspier version for her 2010 album, Bedtime Stories.

Rose continued, “[Lisa] wrote the song by herself a few years ago, I think about 10 years ago. And no one’s really wanted to touch it because there’s some things in it that might ruffle a few feathers.”

Within Rose’s rendition, slicked back with prominent violin and heart-throbbing percussion, the southern gothic melody remains intact, and Rose, one of the most underrated vocalists of today’s generation, delivers an equally somber and grim performance. She allows the melody to breath, as the instruments slide and grind together to create a particularly moody composition. Even for a mainstream-aiming single, it’s still rather adventurous, layering on thick Bobbie Gentry coat.

In a much later interview with American Songwriter, Rose dug further into why she chose to record such a bold song for her major label debut record. “If you don’t dig deeper she doesn’t appear to be a sympathetic character, but you find yourself relating to her throughout the song. I think it’s terrifying to think of the fact that everyone has their breaking point and to wonder what moment, what event, what suppressed memory could affect where that breaking point is?” she pondered of the song, whose innate gallop is still ever-present in her own rendition.

“After hearing the song for the first time, I was haunted by the story and found myself thinking about the complexity of the character and how against all odds I liked her because she is a survivor who was pushed to her own breaking point. It’s a song that has changed my life and since I started singing it five years ago, it has taken on a life of its own,” added Rose.

In the final verse, Rose’s character pays the ultimate price, perhaps escaping further pain and torment. “They’re strapping me down, and I’m scared to die / Now, I ain’t the kind of girl to cry / But I find myself begging God for mercy,” she sings. “My hands are cold as I start to slip / Sodium thiopental drips / The room goes black and I wonder if He heard me…”

“Looking Back Now” or “Whiskey and a Gun” was way ahead of its time but feels just as relevant as ever.

Take a listen to Lisa Carver’s original:

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