Vince
Gill’s “Don’t Let Our Love Start Slippin’ Away” still had a couple of weeks of
1993 before it slipped away from #1. Good song, but perhaps telling that Gill’s
haunting country breakthroughs like “When I Call Your Name” couldn’t quite
climb the mountain but a relatively genreless pop-R&B-country groove could
stand atop it comfortably for a stretch. Then again, Garth Brooks couldn’t have
been bigger, but even he was capable of falling short of #1 if he went too far
afield: in anticipation of his fourth album, he released “We Shall Be Free” as a
lead-off single and it stalled outside of the top ten. For starters, it was
pretty off-format as a sort of soul-gospel pastiche, and the idealistic lyrics
at least implied that things like racism and homophobia are bad, which
unfortunately was pretty controversial for squeamish country radio and TV
programmers in the early ‘90s. Garth rebounded quickly though with the second
single, “Somewhere Other Than the Night,” which garnered him his usual #1
despite being a florid, kind-of-overblown ballad that seemed to overextend his
voice.
Randy
Travis continued to have an unerring handle on what worked for him. “Look
Heart, No Hands” was a warm, peaceful purr of a song about love and contentment
anchored by some nifty childhood bicycle imagery. Doug Stone remained
unassumingly in the mix at or near the top; no one ever tagged him as the next
big thing or anything, but he was a near-effortlessly gifted vocalist that
could transcend the too-cute lyricism of something like “Too Busy Being in
Love.” Travis Tritt, as per usual, continued to rely on slow-burn ballads when
he needed a #1 hit, despite being better at onstage rocking-out than most of
his peers. “Can I Trust You With My Heart” was a power ballad that didn’t
forget the power, and Tritt’s voice was as up to the challenge as usual.
As
with the aforementioned Doug Stone tune, sometimes cute was enough. Lorrie
Morgan’s “What Part of No” was pretty much just a sarcastic t-shirt with a
little barroom vignette built around it and set to music, but it was low-key
catchy and quotable with just enough attitude to sell it. George Strait came
barnstorming in, at least by his usual non-barnstormy standards, with
“Heartland.” It was sort of like a Cajun southern-rock number, sonically
speaking, with pleasant but generic lines about rural life; it was prominently
featured in the Pure Country movie so I guess the departure from his
usual style could be explained by being in character. Sort of like a scruffier,
less-androgynous Ziggy Stardust I guess. Clint Black was changing things up a
bit too; songs like the breezy “When My Ship Comes In” suggested that he was
getting at least a little bored with the hard-country stylings that brought him
to the dance and wanted to indulge his love for the pop-folk stylings of folks
like James Taylor and Jimmy Buffett. It’s good, Black in his prime had a knack
for waxing poetic without drifting pretentious, plus his voice could give just
about anything some bite (this would be tested in later years as he waded
deeper in soft-rock waters).
Reba
McEntire, as I’ve mentioned before, had a thing for hamming it up in elaborate
sort-of-cinematic music videos; clearly dying for a Dollyesque multimedia
career, she succeeded to some extent (you and I never had our own sitcom or got
to be in Tremors with Kevin Bacon) but her sitcom was never as
intentionally funny as the videos accidentally were. “The Heart Won’t Lie,” a
big torchy duet with Vince Gill, is lovely (if generic) and their voices blend
nicely. The video, a weirdly obvious Officer and a Gentleman homage with
Gill in the Louis Gossett Jr. role and Reba McEntire reimagining Richard Gere
as a plucky little redhead – not to mention an implied romance – is a time
capsule I’m sure they both have a good laugh about now and then.
If
McEntire and Gill were among the longtime players getting a boost by country
music’s rising tide, it was time for a raft of even-newercomers to take the
ball for awhile. Sammy Kershaw, a genial Louisiana dude with a big, rich George
Jones twang, came rolling in with the affectionately catchy “She Don’t Know
She’s Beautiful.” Tracy Lawrence was still going strong with the lead single
off his second album: “Alibis” is a mournful, sympathetic little waltz, letting
an unfaithful lover off the hook by admitting one’s own faults, a sort of emotional
maturity you don’t get with much Top 40 country nowadays. John Michael
Montgomery, who looked sort of like Garth Brooks run through a dimple-enhancing
Instagram filter, snagged his first of several #1s with “I Love the Way You
Love Me.” Montgomery seemed almost genetically engineered for country stardom, a
tall athletic good ol’ boy in a Stetson, plus he didn’t have the artistic
ambitions/pretentions of a Garth. The industry might respect an innovator, but
they downright love someone who’ll just sing whatever you ask him to.
As
that sort of mercenary approach started to pile up, there was certainly value
in someone that offered up a point of view. Toby Keith would eventually be one
of those guys and then some. He became a bit of a cultural lightning rod a few
years later for his strongly pro-military songs and statements in an era when a
lot of Americans were feeling at least a little conflicted about some of their
country’s deployments, but you wouldn’t have seen any of that coming with
“Should’ve Been a Cowboy.” With a little lyrical tweaking I guess it could’ve
been a conservative anthem, but as it was it was just a harmless little
singalong in tribute to the old-school Hollywood cowboys like Roy Rogers and
the Gunsmoke crew. Lightweight, but enough of a smash to give him the
cache he’d need to get ornerier and more personal down the line.
Patty
Loveless seemed like a born classic, someone whose approach was both timeless
and well-timed for an era when the traditionalists at least sort of took over.
“Blame It on Your Heart” was co-written by no less a Nashville warhorse than
Harland Howard, a breezy groove couching relatively rapid-fire twangy syllables
in a kiss-off anthem for the ages. Garth Brooks somehow only snagged one week at
#1 with the also-anthemic “That Summer.” It’s a melodramatic story song about a
teenage field hand’s affair with a presumably-attractive older widow woman/employer,
with a big sweeping Springsteen-ish melody that fits Brooks’ gritty,
heart-on-sleeve earnestness like a glove. It’s really too bad that Brooks had
mostly sworn off music videos for the moment; I think we all could’ve used a
toupee’d Brooks playing the kid and perhaps Rue MacLanahan as the female lead.
John Anderson scored one last #1 for his comeback run with the warmhearted
roadhouse twang of “Money in the Bank” before genially easing back down the
charts as the decade wore on. We haven’t gotten to talk about his finest
moment, the previous year’s haunting “Seminole Wind,” because it stalled out at
#2. Still a pretty big hit despite voicing some concerns about ecology and
disappearing cultures that’d spur a bunch of dorks to complain about its
“wokeness” nowadays. Overall, Anderson’s comeback stretch and the quality of
songs he filled it up with were one of ‘90s country’s brightest elements.
Alan
Jackson was more “defining artist” than “bright spot,” and “Chattahoochee”
ended up being a defining moment for both him and the whole genre era. Spurred
on by a simple but instantly recognizable electric guitar run and a bunch of
Cajun-ish fiddle sawing, Jackson’s folksy recounting of youthful good times by
the Georgia river was elevated by its attention to detail and willingness to be
knowingly silly (“hotter than a hoochie-coochie,” et al). Maybe I talk about
country videos too much, but the images of the usually laid-back Jackson
water-skiing in his cowboy hat and generally looking like the most fun guy in
the world amplified the appeal of someone who’d already caught pretty damn on. When
we talk about ‘90s country, I think it’s fair to say Jackson takes a backseat
only to Garth, and if you somehow leave out the pop-crossover stuff it’s not
much of a backseat at all.
The
rest of the year seemed pretty calm by comparison. Mark Chesnutt and “It Sure
is Monday” were upbeat and clever enough, nothing that’d really stick to the
ribs like his best work did. Doug Stone scored with the cutesy lament “Why
Didn’t I Think of That,” and Tracy Lawrence nailed the breezy melancholy of
“Can’t Break it to My Heart” but it wasn’t monumental or anything. Sawyer
Brown’s refreshed roll continued with the likeable groove of “Thank God For
You” and Garth Brooks kicked up the tempo considerably with the motor-mouthed
country-rock sugar rush of “Ain’t Goin’ Down (Til the Sun Comes Up).” Perhaps discouraged
by “We Shall Be Free,” for the moment he was content to relegate his statement
songs to album-track status and score #1 singles with engaging but
less-personal material. East Texas newcomer Tracy Byrd took over for a week with
his hard-country debut “Holdin’ Heaven” but the Garth number snatched it back a
week later … it had been decades since that sort of boomeranging had happened,
but between the new metrics and the glut of talent, it was just a matter of
time.
Vince
Gill kept it simple with “One More Last Chance,” more of a pickin’ showcase
than a hard-hitting song, although the shout-out to George Jones’ drunken
riding mower misadventures was fun (and inspired a Jones cameo in the video).
It wasn’t reflected in the top ten at the time, but it was a big trend for
young country stars to pal around with George Jones, cover him in concert,
bring him in for duets or video appearances, etc. Jones hadn’t had a #1 himself
since 1983 but he at least cracked the Top 40 in ’92 with “I Don’t Need Your
Rockin’ Chair,” which featured brief but recognizable vocal cameos from all of
the “Class of ‘89” plus Gill, Chesnutt, Loveless, Diffie, Pam Tillis and T.
Graham Brown. Then again, as more and more new artists broke through, you’d see
a little less Jones-style influence with time. Clay Walker, a handsome young
East Texas dude with a slightly offbeat growl of a voice and a crowd-pleasing,
mostly-for-the-ladies stage presence, busted through with the big bouncy
country-pop of “What’s It To You.” He had the hat and the Wranglers and all,
and I don’t doubt he grew up on country music, but his style sort of suggested
that his biggest influences might’ve been recent arrivals like Garth, Clint,
etc. as opposed to the legends that influenced them.
George
Strait had moved past the Pure Country album cycle and delivered the
low-key hurt of “Easy Come, Easy Go” with the steady maturity of someone who
wanted to make it clear he hadn’t been infected by all that Hollywood
razzle-dazzle. Reba McEntire, meanwhile, sounded even thirstier for it than
usual on the big-ass country-pop balladry of “Does He Love You,” a duet with
her much-lesser-known contemporary Linda Davis. Davis was a talented singer on
a major record label, it just wasn’t clicking for her and never fully would (her
daughter would be a fairly big star years down the line as a member of Lady
Antebellum). One wonders if Davis wasn’t recruited for her soap opera-esque
good looks as much as anything, because the music video was the real prize
here, with McEntire and Davis in the leads and the song’s romantic rivalry
fleshed out into glitzy red-carpet vignettes, exploding boats and a Rob Reiner
cameo. Again, huge year for Reba videos.
Brooks
& Dunn scored again with the straightforward but beautifully sung country
lament “She Used to Be Mine.” The cliché of watching one’s ex basking in
newfound love at some bar that you both keep going to for some reason is
well-worn – George Strait’s “You Look So Good in Love” is probably the best
one, but this one’s not half bad. Mark Chesnutt sort of ditched the honky-tonk
purism for a big sweeping ballad with “Almost Goodbye,” but his earnest twang
kept it all touchingly down to earth. And then, amidst the newcomers who were
starting to seem like the pillars of modern country radio, Alabama swung in for
one last #1 with “Reckless.”
It
didn’t have the weight of finality on it or anything; Alabama would still crack
the top ten routinely through the rest of the ‘90s, with their last go being
1999’s “God Must Have Spent a Little Time on You,” a collaboration with ‘N Sync
in case you were wondering just what they were willing to do to hang in there. “Reckless”
was the sort of breezy country-rock love song they could’ve cranked out five
years later or five years sooner, pleasant enough without moving any mountains.
But it ended up being a milestone for one of the genre’s defining acts, one
that caught on as young bucks and stuck around long enough to be elder
statesmen, one that nailed the balancing act of how to tastefully blend various
genres of rock and pop into their sound without losing their downhome charm.
Sometimes they’d arguably lean a little too heavily on the Southern/small-town pride,
the iffy rhetoric of treating being born somewhere as an accomplishment in
itself. But then again the bro-country generation that spawned as Alabama
finally faded from the Top 40 in the 2000s would provide contrast for how
relatively tasteful they could be about it.
Garth
Brooks spun in again, and this time it was a bit of a statement song, albeit a
low-stakes one tethered to a pun in “American Honky-Tonk Bar Association.” It
felt a little like an attempt to recapture the populist glory of “Friends in
Low Places,” but despite consistently being one of the warmest and
friendliest-seeming celebrities around Garth was undeniably in a superstar
ivory tower of his own by now. Cranking out lyrics about paychecks and that ol’
Uncle Sam diggin’ in your pockets had lost a little of that relatable shine. The
relatively down-to-earth Tracy Lawrence did more with less on “My Second Home,”
a hangdog-clever number about getting booted out by your old lady and somehow
managing to just move into the bar that got you in trouble with her in the
first place. And then the year wrapped up with another new face: brawny Texas
singer-songwriter Doug Supernaw scored his only #1 with “I Don’t Call Him
Daddy,” a divorced-dad narrative that surely hit home for a hefty subset of
listeners. Supernaw had tried out Nashville in the late ‘80s, retreated back to
Texas to hit the bar band scene, but found himself called back up to the majors
in the early ‘90s gold rush. A talented singer with a palpable charisma, he
faded from the charts fairly quickly from a combo of health and personal issues
(quirkily harmless run-ins with the law would eventually make the news) plus the
difficulty of keeping a foothold in the increasingly relentless churn of the
new era. One can imagine the paranoia under the good ol’ boy veneer of ‘90s
country … when it seems easier than ever to make a star, it’s also easier than
ever to replace one.
THE
TREND?
Year
three or so of a gold rush, pretty much. Lots of new faces, recent arrivals
getting footholds, longer-time artists (which included folks who’d only been
around a handful of years) either branching out with the benefit of their clout
or course-correcting in hopes of keeping it. Lots of folks working their ass
off but trying to keep it chill and relatable on the surface, and looking at
the ranking down there it bore some good fruit: even the last tunes on the list
aren’t stinkers or anything, just lesser lights in a crowded field. For the
moment, something resembling traditionalism still seems to rule the day: only
the Reba and maybe Doug Stone songs veer into easy listening territory, but
still have some recognizable twang. When being a country singer is suddenly
bigger business than ever, there’s not much impetus to pretend to be anything
else.
THE RANKING
- Chattahoochee – Alan Jackson
- Blame it On Your Heart – Patty Loveless
- She Used to Be Mine – Brooks & Dunn
- When My Ship Comes In – Clint Black
- Easy Come, Easy Go – George Strait
- That Summer – Garth Brooks
- Alibis – Tracy Lawrence
- Ain’t Goin’ Down Til the Sun Comes Up – Garth Brooks
- Can I Trust You With My Heart – Travis Tritt
- Look Heart, No Hands – Randy Travis
- Money In the Bank – John Anderson
- She Don’t Know She’s Beautiful – Sammy Kershaw
- Heartland – George Strait
- The Heart Won’t Lie – Reba McEntire & Vince Gill
- Can’t Break it To My Heart – Tracy Lawrence
- Almost Goodbye – Mark Chesnutt
- One More Last Chance – Vince Gill
- Reckless - Alabama
- Don’t Let Our Love Start Slippin’ Away – Vince Gill
- It Sure is Monday – Mark Chesnutt
- I Don’t Call Him Daddy – Doug Supernaw
- Should’ve Been a Cowboy – Toby Keith
- American Honky Tonk Bar Association – Garth Brooks
- Does He Love You – Reba McEntire with Linda Davis
- My Second Home – Tracy Lawrence
- What’s It To You – Clay Walker
- Thank God For You – Sawyer Brown
- Somewhere Other Than the Night – Garth Brooks
- What Part of No – Lorrie Morgan
- Why Didn’t I Think of That – Doug Stone
- Too Busy Being In Love – Doug Stone
- I Love the Way You Love Me - John Michael Montgomery
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