Hands on You

Album: Sparrow (2018)
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Songfacts®:

  • The lead single from Sparrow is a seductive tune, which finds Ashley Monroe tortured emotionally and physically by regret that she didn't make the first move.

    I wish you would have laid your hands on me
    And never let me go
    Drawing pictures on my skin, in places no one's ever been
    I wish I'd have laid my hands on you


    Monroe drew inspiration for this fantasy of sexual desire from a weekend beach trip. The songstress explained to NPR that while her girlfriends were out enjoying themselves, she was confined to bed with a stomach bug. When they returned with tales of good-looking men they'd met, Monroe spun the experience into this R&B-leaning tune.
  • Monroe explained to NPR that he song's sensuality was inspired by a "newfound confidence and feeling like a woman, feeling like a grown-up."

    "I've never really shown that side. It feels so good to be a sexy woman and own it. Women, we have the same desires and the same needs as everybody else. Somehow it kinda gets tiptoed over," she continued. "And I get it. It's kinda taboo, I guess. But now, it's like I'm a mom. I'm married. I can talk about sex because it's clearly a part of my life. I think that it's cool for women to hear it, too."
  • While confined in her bed with her stomach bug during the beach trip, Monroe started singing the first line of the song: "I wish I would've laid my hands on you."

    "I thought, 'Ooh, I like that!,'" she recalled to The Boot. "When I got back from that trip, I had a co-write with Jon Randall, who's one of my favorites ever, and I brought it to him, and he loved it. We wrote that one pretty fast."

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