Tim McGraw Strips Down the Cars’ ‘Drive’ in Stellar Acoustic Performance [Exclusive Premiere]
Tim McGraw is taking fans behind the scenes for a private, stripped-down performance of his new song, "Drive," that he filmed on his bus in an informal jam with his band.
The country superstar and his band members perform in close quarters in the video above, which is premiering exclusively via Taste of Country. He delivers a solid, reflective vocal performance over the top of a more organic arrangement of the song, which McGraw recently released in a studio version that mostly stays faithful to the Cars' original recording from 1984.
“Me and the boys crammed into a bus lounge to do this acoustic version for you," McGraw tells Taste of Country. "Can’t wait to play this next year on tour."
The arrangement above still features the lush synthesizers that set the mood for the track, but replaces much of the rest of the atmospheric instrumentation with more organic acoustic sounds.
The Cars scored a No. 1 hit on Billboard's Adult Contemporary chart and reached No. 3 on the all-genre Billboard Hot 100 when they released "Drive" as the third single from their Heartbeat City album in 1984.
McGraw revealed via Twitter that "Drive" was a song he used to cover back in his bar band days, saying, "It still reminds me of high school."
"Drive" is McGraw's first new music since he released" Thought About You" in October of 2018. The song is presumably from his next album, but McGraw has not yet revealed the details of any upcoming project.
McGraw's rendition of "Drive" is currently available across a wide array of digital music retailers.
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