A 12-pack of Alan Jackson Tunes - plus one to go

Last week marked the retirement of one of country music’s most acclaimed artists, Alan Jackson.  Since arriving on the scene in the late 1980s, Jackson was consistently one of the successful artists in country music – both commercially and critically. In a career that lasted more than 35 years, Jackson produced:

·         15 Platinum records, 8 of which were multiplatinum

·         55 Top 20 hits

·         49 Top 10 hits

·         44 Top 5 hits

·         25 #1 hits

·         A whole bunch of songs with unnecessary parenthesis 😉

Throughout it all, Jackson never strayed from his country roots.  While other artists may have dabbled in rock or pop, Jackson – much like his contemporaries and friends George Strait and Randy Travis – remained steadfastly in the world of fiddles and steel guitars. Jackson was essentially forced to retire as a result of his ongoing battle with a neurological disorder and he capped his terrific career with an emotional farewell concert in Nashville.

As a tribute to AJ and his influence on country music, I give you my favorite 13 Alan Jackson songs.  Think of it as a 12-pack of tunes—plus one to go.  (By the way, it was really hard to whittle this last down to just 13.  But when you have an artist who has had so much success and produced so much great music over the years – as evidence by the statistics listed above – it’s always going to be tough to come up with a list of favorites.)

Having said all of that, here we go – my 13 favorite Alan Jackson songs of all time:

13.        “Where Were You (When the World Stopped Turning)” (2001) – Written and recorded in the wake of the 9/11 attacks, the song addresses the shock and anger the country experienced in their aftermath.  Through a series of questions, it presents numerous situations and possible reactions to what happened.  With a catchy chorus and a blessedly unpolitical bent (jn contrast to songs by Toby Keith, Aaron Tippin and Darryl Worley that were also released following the terrorist attacks), the song captured the country’s mood and became a way to unite people. The song was also a monster hit for Jackson, topping the country charts for five weeks, winning multiple “Song of the Year” awards and even his first Grammy Award. It also even cracked the Top 30 on the Billboard Hot 100, a rarity for a country artist at the time.

12.        “Livin’ On Love” (1994) – It’s a sunny, straightforward, singable tune about relationships surviving on love as opposed to money or other things. The first verse tells of a young couple who don’t have much in the way of material possessions, but they have each other and that is enough.  The second verse tells of that same couple who are now old and who have raised their kids. They still don’t have much in terms of possessions, but they are just happy to spend time together sitting on their front porch swing. Again, all they really need is one another.

11.        “Here in the Real World” (1990) – The song was Jackson’s first hit song, peaking at #3 on the country charts.  It deftly juxtaposes the fiction of the movies (where there are almost always happy endings) and real life, where hearts get broken and tears fall. The well written lyrics are paired with Jackson’s mournful vocals and backed by fiddle and steel guitar and showed that the new “hat act” was going to be a force to be reckoned with.  Readers of this blog undoubtedly know my affinity for sad songs and this one definitely delivers.

10.        “Drive (For Daddy Gene)” (2002) – One of the great things about country music is the story telling and how a 3 or 4 minute song can take you in a time machine or down memory lane.  This song may be one of the best examples of that in all of Jackson’s repertoire.  It pays tribute to Jackson’s father by relaying the times when his dad allowed him to drive a boat on a lake and drive an old built-up truck down a dirt road and how he felt like “king of the ocean” and “Mario Andretti” (respectively) when he did so.  The third verse flips the script and has Jackson as the dad teaching his daughters to drive his old Jeep on a pasture and hoping that those memories will mean as much to them as his time with his own father did.  It’s a timeless, heartfelt sentiment which no doubt is one of the reasons the song not only topped the country charts but also made it to #28 on the Billboard Hot 100.

9.           “She’s Got the Rhythm (And I Got the Blues)” (1992) – Co-written with Randy Travis, the intent was to originally pitch it to B.B. King.  Instead, Jackson elected to record it himself and it wound up topping the country charts in late 1992. This was one of the earlier non-Garth Brooks country songs I came to like, seeing as how it was released during the fall of my freshman year of college in Texas. It has a great title (with the arguably unnecessary parenthetical), a great two-step beat, plenty of fiddle and steel guitar and what might be the funniest “yee haw” in country music history.

8.           “(Who Says) You Can’t Have It All” (1994) – A superb country weeper dripping with mournful steel guitar, the narrator details that he has a bedroom with just a single “stark naked” lightbulb, a double bed with “one lonely pillow” and walls papered with pictures of and letters from his former love.  In the chorus, he says that “he’s got everything a broken heart needs” and sarcastically says “who says you can’t have it all?” The lyrics and Jackson’s broken-hearted delivery of them, backed by the sad steel guitar and the waltz beat – make this a terrific example of a sad country song.

7.           “Midnight in Montgomery” (1992) – It’s an eerie ghost story about visiting Hank Williams’s grave site in Montgomery, AL at midnight on New Year’s Eve and having an encounter with Hank’s ghost.  Largely acoustic with some steel guitar and a sprinkling of fiddle, it’s an imaginative, evocative number that pays tribute to one old country music legend while helping to solidify the status of a new one.

6.           “Don’t Rock the Jukebox” (1991) – This one is a catchy number in which the heartbroken narrator pleads for someone in line for the jukebox to play a sad country song instead of a rock and roll song.  In the chorus, it cleverly rhymes “Jones” (as in George Jones) with “Rolling Stones”. In addition to being a chart-topping hit, it also was the ASCAP award for Country Song of the Year. It’s one of those songs that is fun to sing along to and that might have you driving a little faster down the highway than you realize.

5.           “Gone Country” (1994) – The only song on this list not written or co-written by Jackson, it simultaneously celebrates country music while also skewering the carpetbaggers who have turned to country music in an attempt to revive their flagging careers. I initially liked the song because it was so catchy and singable but grew to like it even more once I realized the double meaning of the lyrics.

4.           “Chasin’ that Neon Rainbow” (1990) – It’s a semi-autobiographical tale of a young man trying to make it big as a country singer, with “chasin’ that neon rainbow” being a metaphor for pursuing success by playing in honky tonks while trying to make it to Music Row in Nashville. 

3.           “Wanted” (1990) – The lyrics in the verses are half of a conversation between a brokenhearted man talking to someone at a newspaper in which he wants to take out a classified personal ad in an attempt to win back his ex-lover.  The lyrics in the chorus contain the words of that classified ad.  It’s a unique and clever approach that made it stand out and helped put Jackson on the map as a country hit maker.

2. “Chattahoochee” (1993) – It’s a fun song about growing up and the fun times the narrator had while growing up with his friends along the Chattahoochee River in Georgia.  It includes the great line in which “he was willing” but his date “wasn’t ready” so “he settled for a burger and a grape snow cone.” It oozes nostalgia about the fun summers of youth and it’s impossible to listen to without tapping your toe and singing along. (Full disclosure: while I love the original version, which is two and a half minutes of pure country summer bliss, I loathe the longer dance mix version which adds a drum machine and is needlessly repetitive.  Darn those ‘90s country line dancers!)

1. “Dallas” (1992) – This one may be a surprise because it’s not one of Jackson’s biggest hits or most well-known songs, though it did hit #1 in early 1992. Propelled by a little steel guitar and a lot of fiddle, it cleverly has the singer in love with a girl named Dallas, who left him in Tennessee to go back to Dallas, Texas.  This lends a double meaning to the line “Oh how I wish Dallas was in Tennessee.”  Maybe it was because I had recently arrived in Texas for college when I discovered the song, but it’s always held a soft spot in my heart. It’s another song that I love to sign along with and I never get tired of hearing it.

 

There you have it – my 13 favorite Alan Jackson songs – a tribute to a country legend whose songs will still be played, sung and listened to long after his retirement.

What songs did I miss or did you expect to see on my list?  With someone who has such a rich catalog of music, I’m sure some of you have favorites that didn’t make my cut.

 

 

Still More Song Lyrics I Love

A few times in the distant past (February 2017 and August 2018) I did previous posts about my favorite song lyrics.  (Feel free to check those previous posts out!)  Now, all these years later, I’d like to dip back into that well and share with you more of my favorite song lyrics.

Artist: Goo Goo Dolls
Songwriter: John Rzeznik
Song: “Name”
Lyric: “Scars are souvenirs you never lose, the past is never far”
Why I Love It: No matter how long ago you sustained a scar, it remains there for the rest of your life, a reminder of things that happened in the past. This rings true whether you’re referring to physical scars – from a past injury or surgery – or emotional scars from a prior trauma or a past relationship that went sour.

 

Artist: Simon & Garfunkel
Songwriter: Paul Simon
Song: “The Sound of Silence”
Lyric: “People talking without speaking, people hearing without listening”
Why I Love It: This line sums up, in a lot of ways, our society today, especially in terms of politics and what passes as “discussion” in this age of sound bites and social media posts.  People are so concerned about saying their piece that they don’t take the time to stop and figure out a way to say it coherently or respectfully, without yelling.  Likewise, others are so anxious to respond that they are working on their talking points without actually listening to what the other person is saying.  It’s wild to me that Paul Simon captured the essence of this dynamic when he wrote the song in the mid-1960s and that it rings just as true – and maybe more so – 60 years later.
 

Artist: Indigo Girls
Songwriter: Emily Saliers
Song: “Closer to Fine”
Lyric: “Darkness has a hunger that’s insatiable, lightness has a call that’s hard to hear, and I wrap my fear around me like a blanket”
Why I Love It: As someone who has battled depression in the past, I relate to the hunger of darkness and how it can sometimes be quite seductive.  At the same time, sometimes it’s easy to miss (or, conversely, tough to see) the light and the good things in your life or in the world around you.  Too often too many people lean into the darkness and use their fear to “protect” them from things they don’t like or don’t understand.  In many ways, I think this is at the root of the MAGA movement in the U.S. – seeing the bogeyman or the enemy everywhere and dealing with things they don’t understand (different religions, people from different countries with different languages or cultures) by wrapping themselves in a blanket of fear rather than making efforts to actually see the positive aspects of these things.
 
Artist: American Aquarium
Songwriter: BJ Barham
Song: “Cherokee Purples”
Lyric: “Ain’t it funny how a memory comes flooding back so fast when you accidentally stir up moments from the past”
Why I Love It: I’ve written before about the power of music and how a song can transport you back to a specific place in time.  The same thing can happen with certain sounds or smells.  Often, it’s unexpected and it just hits you and a certain scent or sound can stir up memories and moments from your youth. This whole song is about that phenomenon but the aforementioned lyric from the song’s chorus really summarizes it and brings it home.
 
Artist: Pearl Jam
Songwriter: Eddie Vedder (lyrics); Pearl Jam (music)
Song: “Rearviewmirror”
Lyric: “Saw things so much clearer once you were in my rearview mirror”
Why I Love It: Whether we want to admit it or not, every one of us has had some sort of a toxic relationship in our lives.  Maybe it was with an ex-spouse or ex-lover or a former best friend. Maybe it was with a boss or a co-worker.  Regardless, because all of us have experienced a bad relationship or a bad situation, we can all also relate to this lyric, especially the truth that we oftentimes don’t realize HOW toxic or HOW bad the relationship or situation was until after we have escaped and we’re looking back at where we were.  The lyric itself is enough, but the way it is delivered in the song really drives it home.  Over a propulsive beat that makes you feel like you are driving in a car, leaving that bad situation or relationship behind, Eddie Vedder delivers the above lyric in a clenched, strangled near scream that you can completely relate to. I suspect that all of us can picture a situation or a person when we listen to this song; I know that I certainly can.
 
   
Artist: Gary Allan
Songwriter: Gary Allan, Hillary Lindsey, Matt Warren
Song: “Every Storm (Runs Out of Rain)”
Lyric: “So hold your head up and tell yourself that there’s something more and walk out that door. Go find a new rose, don’t be afraid of the thorns ‘cause we all have thorns.”
Why I Love It:  Similar to “Rearviewmirror,” this song touches on the end of relationship, using a storm as a metaphor to describe it.  The line “go find a new rose, don’t be afraid of the thorns ‘cause we all have thorns” was what initially caught my attention.  I loved that imagery, of relating a new relationship to a rose and not being afraid to grab new one.  But I think the prior line, about walking out the door makes the line about the rose that more poignant.  It paints a picture of someone having the courage to leave one (presumably bad) relationship and likewise having the courage to be vulnerable and pursue a new relationship.  As someone who personally saw one relationship end badly and who subsequently found his soul mate not too long afterwards, this whole idea resonates with me.
 
Artist: INXS
Songwriter: Andrew Farriss, Michael Hutchence
Song: “Devil Inside”
Lyric: “Words are weapons, sharper than knives”
Why I Love It:  The old saying “sticks and stones may break my bones but words will never hurt me” is, to be frank, a bunch of crap. While it may seem true on the surface, those broken bones tend to heal a lot quicker than the wounds caused by unkind words.  Words can cause emotional and psychological damage that lasts years and, in some cases, a lifetime.  With that truth acknowledged, this lyric certainly delivers, conveying in six words the power that words can have.
 
Artist: Better Than Ezra
Songwriter: Kevin Griffin
Song: “Scared, Are You?”
Lyric: “Kind words are scarce at best when you need them most”
Why I Love It:  Continuing the theme of how powerful words can be, this lyric looks at things from the opposite side from the lyric in “Devil Inside.”  While that one focuses on the damage that words can do, this one focuses on how the absence of kind words can also hurt.  We can all relate to having a really bad day and then a kind word or a kind gesture directed your way can make a huge difference. It can turn around your whole day and break you out of your funk.  By the same token, when you’re in a really dark spot and you really need a kind word, sometimes they are nowhere to be found, which can make that darkness even more smothering.  Needing a kind word or gesture is something universal, as is the absence of the same, which is why I can absolutely relate to what Kevin Griffin is saying here.
 
Artist: American Aquarium
Songwriter: BJ Barham
Song: “Messy as a Magnolia”
Lyric: “Behind every good man is a better somebody that should have never stuck around”
Why I Love It:  I’m convinced that behind every good or great man is someone else even better who has supported that person and given them the foundation and the courage to be good.  Oftentimes, that “better somebody” is a spouse or significant other – but it doesn’t necessarily have to be.  It could be a sibling or a best friend or a parent.  Aside from the truth of the point that Barham is making, I love the fact that he words it in such a way as to make it more universal than the usual “behind every good man is a better woman.”  Incidentally, I think the same sentiment holds true regardless of the gender of the protagonist or the supporter.  The bottom line is that no one can be great without getting support from others.
 
Artist: Trisha Yearwood
Songwriter: Jon Ims
Song: “She’s in Love With The Boy”
Lyric: “What’s meant to be will always find a way”
Why I Love It:  It’s almost a throwaway line at the end of the song and I didn’t even pay any attention to it the first 500 or so times I’d heard it.  It wasn’t until the other day, actually listening to a cover version of the song by American Aquarium, that the lyric really reached out and grabbed me.  Maybe it’s because of how my wife and I met – the improbability of it but then also the many obstacles that presented themselves along the way – that the lyric finally hit me the way it did.  She and I have talked about how our meeting and our relationship was “a God thing” and this line has much the same sentiment, albeit without the overt religious overtones.  “What’s meant to be will always find a way.”  The inevitability of God’s plan or fate or whatever you want to call it – that if something is destined to happen, it will, in spite of any hurdles or obstacles that may appear to get in the way. In what is often an angry, cynical world, the sentiment is something that can bring everyone a little hope and happiness.
 
OK, that’s all for now.  As always, thanks for reading!

Are We Living in a Dystopian Novel?

At many times over the past decade, it has been hard to believe some of the things that have happened or are happening in the United States.  From overt and verbalized racism from the president and other top government officials to attempts to overthrow the 2020 presidential election by attacking the U.S. Capitol to bands of masked, militarized federal police forces on the streets of our cities, it seems in many ways like we are living in a dystopian novel.

For decades, novels that relayed or portrayed a dystopian future country or planet have been written and gained prominence.  Some of you very well may have read some of them in school, while others may have watched film or television adaptations of the novels, while still others of you may have done both.  While some of these books may have been written and published merely for entertainment value, others were intended to be satires and cautionary tales about the dangers of fascism, totalitarianism and authoritarianism.  Considering that some of these novels were written in the aftermath of World War II in the late 1940s and early 1950s, it can be very unsettling to see how accurately they portray things that we see happening around us every day.

Perhaps the most well-known and most frequented referenced dystopian novel is George Orwell’s Nineteen Eighty-Four.  First published in 1949, it tells the story of a fictional (or is it?) future in Oceania, a totalitarian state/country.  Oceania is led by Big Brother, a dictatorial leader.  In addition to introducing the concept of “big brother” to represent a repressive or overreaching government, it featured government surveillance and propaganda, with the latter largely to create a cult of personality related to Big Brother.  The “Ministry of Truth” churns out propaganda extolling the virtues of Big Brother and aimed at convincing the citizens of Oceania that things are great, in spite of concrete evidence to the contrary.  Anyone who has been paying attention sees these trends in our country today, with social media posts from The White House, the Department of Labor and other government agencies constantly praising President Trump and how prices are down even as everyday Americans see their grocery bills continue to skyrocket.  They tout job creation numbers and unemployment figures that are undercut by empirical data from the Bureau of Labor Statistics and others.  When there are was government shutdown last fall, Trump and his cabinet members – as well as others beholden to Trump – did a full court press to convince Americans that the shutdown was all the fault of the Democrats.  In press conferences, interviews and social media posts, we were inundated with daily instructions that “It’s the Democrats’ fault” when there was much evidence to the contrary.  The very fact that government entities and representatives were trying so hard to convince people who to blame was chilling. One recurring theme in Nineteen Eighty-Four and other dystopian novels is blaming someone else – “them,” “others,” “the enemy”– for everything bad that happens.  We have seen this countless times in the past several years, as Trump and his MAGA bootlickers try to pin the blame for all the ills of the country on immigrants or minorities or college professors.

In Nineteen Eighty-Four and other dystopian novels, one common theme is that the leader is always right.  When he (because it’s pretty much always a male) is actually wrong, interviews are given and press conferences are held to try to explain away inconsistencies or attempt to rewrite or reframe what the leader said or did.  How many times over the last year have we seen Karoline Leavitt stand at a podium and repeat blatant lies in defense of Trump?  After promising during the campaign last year that he would release the Epstein files, Trump and his administration have instead obstructed, redacted and moved the goalposts in an effort to hide the fact that they are hiding something.  Again, it’s the sort of behavior you routinely see leaders in dystopian novels exhibit.

In The Hunger Games, the corrupt Capital sends out groups of masked, heavily armed security forces (called “peacekeepers”) to keep the citizens in line and enforce the Capital’s rules. It does not take much to see much of the same thing in what has been happening in Minneapolis, Chicago and other cities with ICE.  Masked, heavily armed, questionably trained “police” forces indiscriminately arresting, assaulting and, yes, even killing innocent citizens.  They act with impunity and say that basic constitutional protections do not exist and that they take their orders directly from the executive branch.  Many of the peacekeepers in The Hunger Games are sadistic individuals who thrive on a show of force and violence. Sadly, it seems like the same can be said for some of those in ICE.

Another issue over the past few years has been the censorship of books and the disdain for reading, things that call to mind Ray Bradbury’s Fahrenheit 451, first published in 1953.  While we may not see the sorts of book burnings that occur in that novel, and that occurred in Germany during the Nazi regime, there have been Congressional hearings on censorship and banning books simply because some people find the material in those books objectionable.  In almost all of these dystopian novels, there is a hatred of education and a desire by the state for citizens to just follow along and do what those in power want them to do.  How many times in the past 10 years have we heard people denigrate college degrees or being educated, talking about how universities are “woke” and how they “indoctrinate” students?  Of course, those who are well read recognize that an uneducated populace is more easily manipulated, a theme that appears countless times across countless dystopian novels. Ironically, many of the people lambasting colleges and education are themselves graduates of elite, selective private universities.  Donald Trump went to Penn.  Josh Hawley went to Stanford and Yale.  Ted Cruz went to Princeton and Harvard.  Education at the highest levels was fine for them, but you shouldn’t do it because it will warp your mind and make you “woke.”  Of course, that’s because they know that an educated populace will see through their bullshit and understand that the game is rigged and those who are wealthy and in power are only concerned with remaining wealthy and in power.

A few months ago, Trump announced some upcoming “Patriot Games” in which a few people from each state would compete against one another for bragging rights and the entertainment of an elite few.  Anyone who has read The Hunger Games undoubtedly sees the chilling similarities between what happens in that novel and what Trump has proposed.

Finally, novels such as The Handmaid’s Tale describe a society in which the only value of women is to get pregnant and have babies.  Those who cannot or who choose not to are scorned and treated with contempt.  Heaven forbid a woman think and make choices for herself in terms of what is right for her in terms of getting an education, having a career or becoming a mother. Sadly, similar viewpoints have been espoused more and more often lately by some on the extreme right.  We have politicians and political talking heads advocating for the repeal of the 19^th Amendment to the U.S. Constitution – you know, the amendment that gave women the right to vote – because they say women are “too emotional” and cannot be trusted to make good decisions in the voting booth.  As absurd as that notion is in and of itself, it’s blatantly hypocritical having seen what we’ve seen out of Trump and other MAGA folks over the past 10 years.  Donald Trump is the most emotionally unhinged person to ever occupy the White House and his frequent deranged rants on social media and in press conferences have shown him time and again to be mentally unstable.  So, it’s okay for someone like that to occupy the presidency but it’s not okay for the average female to be able to vote?  Men have controlled the levers of power in this country and all around the world for millennia and all it has gotten us are countless wars and an oligarchy that increasingly concentrates obscene wealth in the hands of a small contingency of males while millions are starving or homeless.  Lately, there has been talk of “marriage camps” and “money for babies” and other ways to try to convince women that they need only to worry about being a mother.  Don’t learn, don’t vote, don’t speak, don’t think for yourself.  Just keep popping out babies and everything will be wonderful.

It’s one thing to read some of the aforementioned dystopian novels and perhaps be taken aback by the conditions presented, while at the same time saying “That could never happen to us, here in the real world, here in the United States of America.”  But if you look around these days, you’ll see that some of these things ARE happening here today – and suddenly the worst of those fictional, oppressive government regimes doesn’t seem so far fetched or fictional.