If outlaw music is a slow drag on a cigarette in the rain, then Buckcherry’s “Set It Free” is that first shot of whiskey that punches through your teeth and reminds you you’re still alive. This ain’t subtle. It ain’t clean. And it sure as hell ain’t polite. It’s rock-n-roll revivalism, revved to redline, kicking in the door and flipping the finger to anyone clinging to the past.
Right from the jump, “Set It Free” delivers a riff that stomps in like it’s been drinking gasoline. It’s got that filthy, blues-drenched swagger Buckcherry’s built a career on — raw power wrapped in sleaze and sweat. The drums pound with a loose confidence, and the bass growls like a Harley left idling in a dive bar parking lot.
Josh Todd’s vocals are a perfect mess — gritty, strained, and human. He ain’t trying to hit notes. He’s trying to hit nerve endings. He howls about breaking chains, getting loose, and burning every last rulebook — and you believe him, because he sounds like he already lit the match.
Lyrically, “Set It Free” is less about poetry and more about release. It’s the sound of a man kicking out of his cage and daring the world to stop him. “I ain’t living in your cage no more / I got my demons but I settled the score.” It’s the kind of song you play when you finally tell the job, the ex, or the system to go to hell — and then peel out into the night.
What makes this fit into the Outlaw Circus catalog isn’t the genre — it’s the attitude. This is outlaw rock in its purest modern form: loud, flawed, and unrepentant. There’s no fake polish here. Just raw nerve and dirty amplifiers.
The production is tight but not sterile — everything’s dialed in to sound alive. The solo in the bridge squeals and snarls like it’s chewing through rusted steel, and the final chorus comes back like a punch you didn’t see coming.
“Set It Free” doesn’t want to be your favorite track. It wants to be the one that gets you arrested or saved — depending on what kind of night you’re having.
It’s not music for the radio. It’s music for the back alley behind the radio station — blasting from the tape deck of a car nobody ever expected to keep running this long.
And yet… here it is. Still roaring. Still breaking free.
