Lisa Lim’s “Lucky One” is one of those songs that sneaks up on you. It doesn’t hit you over the head with drama, and it doesn’t drown in sentimentality. Instead, it just breathes; slow, steady, confident. The kind of song that sounds like it’s been sitting by a river for an hour, thinking about life and deciding to be okay with it.
Lim wrote “Lucky One” about her grandmother, about family, about time spent along the river. On paper, that sounds like the setup for a Hallmark-level nostalgia piece. But that’s not what she’s doing. The track feels more like someone leafing through an old photo album and realizing they’ve finally stopped trying to fix the past. It’s gratitude, sure, but gratitude earned the hard way.
The sound sits somewhere between rootsy Americana and shimmering pop-rock. Imagine Sheryl Crow if she took more walks alone at sunset, and I say that as a compliment to both artists. The slide guitar glides through the mix like the river itself, smooth but with little ripples of tension. The production, handled by Dan Scholes, keeps things tactile and human: you can hear the scrape of strings, the breath between vocal lines, the quiet moments that would’ve been edited out of a lesser song.
What really lands, though, is the tone. Lim doesn’t belt or beg for your attention; she just invites you in. There’s power in that restraint. Her voice has this natural warmth that makes you believe every word. When she sings about being the lucky one, it feels like she’s convincing herself as much as anyone else.
There’s a kind of emotional archaeology going on here. Lim’s not just writing about her grandmother; she’s digging into what that relationship means now that she’s older, how love mutates but doesn’t disappear. The river metaphor isn’t subtle, but it’s effective: time moves forward whether we like it or not, and all we can do is float as gracefully as possible.
Lisa Lim’s “Lucky One” doesn’t reinvent anything; it doesn’t need to. It’s sincere, unpretentious, and quietly devastating in its simplicity. Lisa Lim’s not trying to make the next viral anthem; she’s making something better: a song that feels real. And in a landscape full of overproduced emotional cosplay, that’s a very lucky thing indeed.
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About the Author
A tenured media critic known working as a ghost writer, freelance critic for publications in the US and former lead writer of Atop The Treehouse. Reviews music, film and TV shows for media aggregators.
