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Traitor Joe

Credits

Release Date

Record Label

Performance

Reviewer

Kristin Smith

Album Review

Country music is making room on its proverbial playlist for rising star Megan Moroney. 

This 25-year-old burgeoning country singer topped charts in 2022 with her single, “Tennessee Orange,” which is speculated to be about another huge name in country music: Morgan Wallen. But this Georgia native has neither confirmed nor denied these rumors. Instead, she’s continuing to build a name for herself. 

Moroney has more than four million monthly listeners on Spotify and nearly 46,000 subscribers on her YouTube channel. With her latest release “Traitor Joe” from her debut album Lucky, those numbers will continue to grow. 

This country-pop tune finds Moroney warning a close male friend about his unfaithful girlfriend, all while attempting to steer his affection toward someone else … someone like her. 

POSITIVE CONTENT

Moroney warns a guy named Joe that his girlfriend has been found cozying up with another man and that she’s “a wolf in sheep’s clothes.” 

Because of that, Moroney tells Joe that he should look elsewhere for faithful love (“You deserve a girl who’s gonna treat you right”). And it just so happens that the girl he really deserves is her (“You should trade her, trade her in for a girl like me”). 

CONTENT CONCERNS

The duplicitous woman Moroney warns about here is obviously bad news. She has a boyfriend, but spends her free time getting intimate with another man (“Well last night I saw your girlfriend at the bar, in a car in the parkin’ lot in some guy’s arms”). 

And Moroney assumes she’s a liar as well as a cheater (“So go ahead and ask about her night/And when she looks you in the еye and lies/You’re gonna hate her”). Which, according to Moroney, means that Joe needs a new girl. 

The woman Moroney is singing about quite likely has the character issues she points out. But Moroney’s narrator here is also willing to be a bit manipulative herself to get what she wants. 

TRACK SUMMARY

“Traitor Joe” (which is almost certainly intended to remind us of the popular grocery store Trader Joe’s) is reminiscent of old-school Taylor Swift, where Swift wrote often of the men she loved who just couldn’t seem to drop their “toxic” girlfriends. 

Apparently, Moroney feels the same, and perhaps the Swift vibes here are linked to the description of herself in her Instagram bio: “professional emo cowgirl.” 

There’s a tinge of “emo” here. But mostly this song is about an unfaithful girlfriend and the loyal (if perhaps a bit opportunistic) young woman who’d like to help poor ol’ Joe find a new girlfriend. 

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Kristin Smith

Kristin Smith joined the Plugged In team in 2017. Formerly a Spanish and English teacher, Kristin loves reading literature and eating authentic Mexican tacos. She and her husband, Eddy, love raising their children Judah and Selah. Kristin also has a deep affection for coffee, music, her dog (Cali) and cat (Aslan).