✨Ticket to Anywhere✨

Fast Car // Tracy Chapman (And Luke Combs)

So much happened at the Grammy’s I would LOVE to talk about in this space. Joni Mitchell! Billy Joel! TAYLOR!!!!

But those are other cocktails for another day.

Today, what I keep thinking about is Tracy and Luke. Did you see their performance? Go watch it for the first time or again. It’s so good.

The way that Luke watches her. The way he lip syncs the words while she is singing the song. The reverence he had for her as an artist and the humble way she carried herself on that stage alongside him. You know I love a collab. This one was just perfection.

But I think what made it such a stunning performance was the interview Luke gave before. He talked about how the first time he heard this song he was sitting next to his dad in his old pickup truck. It became one of the first songs he learned to play and it was one he carried with him throughout his career. To be on a Grammy stage performing alongside one of his idols has got to be a top moment of his entire career. 

Admittedly I never cared about Luke Combs cover. I love the original. I love Tracy Chapman’s emotional vocal performance. The way she almost holds back, and yet the words are strong. She’s singing about finding a way out of a cycle of abuse. When she sings “had a feeling I could be someone, be someone, be someone” you believe her. You believe her because she is someone, but you also believe her because isn’t that what we all want to believe? 

I’m thinking about Luke’s dad. I’m thinking about how when he put that song on for his son in the car, he could never have known that one day he’d hear him playing that song on the radio, or better yet, on the stage at the Grammy’s with Tracy Chapman herself. That wasn’t his plan, at least I don’t imagine it was. I certainly am not thinking about my that every time I put on another Taylor Swift record for my eye-rolling kids in the car (BUT WOULDN’T THAT BE AMAZING IF MY KIDS SANG ON STAGE WITH TAYLOR ONE DAY!? MANIFESTING THAT!!!) I’m guessing he just liked the song and wanted to share it with his son. Music has a way of connecting us where words cannot. 

But something happens when someone wraps their arm around our shoulder and lets us in on something they love–we start to believe we belong. And when we feel we belong, we start to be believe we can be someone. 

On that stage at the Grammy night, I think in many ways Tracy and Luke had the same kind of conversation. You belong here, she said. You became someone, he said back. 

With today’s cocktail I’m mixing up a duet of my own. It’s a rif on a margarita, the original fast car. But we’re adding a bit of a spin with olive brine and blood orange juice. You put the two together and it’s a ticket to anywhere. I pair it with Tracy’s version, but you could do Luke’s song, too. They both belong with this briney, tangy, subtly sweet Marg-tini.

 

✨Ticket to Anywhere Margtini✨

3 oz. Tequila

1.5 oz Lime Juice

1.5 oz. Triple Sec

1 oz Olive Brine

.5 oz Blood Orange juice

Shake everything with ice. Poor into chilled martini glass. Garnish with olives. Serves two, but you don’t have to share the stage if you don’t want to.