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.
