A sexy accent and wasboard abs have cost me money before. Give me one hot guy in another time zone and suddenly I am doing stupid shit with airline miles that made perfect sense after midnight. I can play the field when I want to, and there have been stretches where my dating-app map looked more ambitious than my travel plans. Every now and then, though, one guy becomes the inconvenience you willingly keep scheduling. Siena Fantini gets that on cross country. She sounds fully capable of widening the search radius when Los Angeles starts looking bleak, with one particular boy still getting preferred boarding. She already knows the fling has an expiration date and keeps coming back anyway because apparently a good accent can make common sense pack a fucking carry-on.
Sean Hurley produced cross country and plays bass, while Kiel Feher’s drums keep the whole thing bouncing forward like it has somewhere better to be. The synths arrive bright enough to put the windows down before the first verse gets comfortable, and Andrew Synowiec’s guitar gives the song a breezy little lift that suits Siena’s “can’t a girl have fun?” attitude. This is pop built for movement. It sounds like the first hour of a road trip when everybody still likes each other and nobody has started bitching about where to stop.
Advertisement
“I like when they speak Greek / a time zone can’t beat me” gets even better once +30 shows up. Greece uses +30, but the old “it’s Greek to me” joke is hanging around here too, which fits a girl who later admits she loves the inaccessible when it’s barely bearable. Then she gets wonderfully practical with “LA’s been especially barren lately / heard Boston’s getting popular lately” before tossing out “I love your area code / +30, just text me.” The whole verse has the confidence of a girl who could widen her options whenever she gets bored, while one number keeps getting special treatment. I respect the efficiency. If the local dating pool is giving you nothing, expand the fucking search radius.
The second verse is where casual starts charging interest. “your accent / is perfect / I swoon / and that’s it” is adorable, and then Siena casually tells us how badly this is going to age with “I’ll write / you songs / you’ll break / it off / summer / dumb fling / by fall / it wrecks me.” Babe, that is an itinerary with emotional baggage already checked. I have entered “this is just fun” situations with enough confidence to deserve a loyalty program, then acted personally offended when the other person honored the terms. Siena sees the fall coming and books summer anyway.
Then she admits the real attraction with “I love the inaccessible when it’s barely bearable,” and suddenly the distance feels intentional. She likes the difficulty enough to keep feeding it. “Treat me abhorrent boy at least you’re not boring boy” is the line that makes the whole fucking thing snap into focus for me because boredom is clearly the greater offense here. I understand the instinct. A sensible guy can become wallpaper fast when the inconvenient one has a perfect accent and enough unpredictability to keep the group chat employed. Siena knows she is repeating herself too with “once is coincidence but twice is happenstance.” At that point the summer fling has become a recurring reservation.
Advertisement
Siena Fantini is a 17-year-old Los Angeles native who started in musical theater before voice and piano lessons pulled her deeper into songwriting. Her recent sophomore EP laundry list already established her habit of writing from lived teenage experience, and cross country keeps that diary-door-open quality while letting her have some fucking fun with it. She cites Lizzy McAlpine and Gracie Abrams among her influences, while this song lets the fling stay casual and enjoy its own ridiculous geography. Sometimes the boy is inconvenient as hell and still worth the text.
I know the appeal of keeping a few options around, and I also know how quickly one inconvenient person can start monopolizing the schedule. cross country gets that and leaves the soulmate audition for somebody else. Siena can browse the map and keep +30 close enough to text.
