Production-wise, this album sounds VERY similar to George Strait's "Honkytonkville". . .i wonder if it was the same producer
also, just fyi, Toby wrote every song on the album . . . maybe thats why its so good
New Toby Keith CD
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DeactiveCarib
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New Toby Keith CD
has anyone listened to the new Toby Keith CD yet? I think its really good, probably his best CD in the new millenium. Ive always favored his ballads and I'm happy to see that this one is filled with them. I really expected this album to be crap and i wasn't planning on buying it, because Toby is not on good terms with his label and after he's out of his contract (which now consists of just one more album) he's going to start his own label . . . but very surprisingly, this is IMO the best thing he's put out in a very long time. Sure, it is clearly pop-country, but the ballads are really something on this album . . almost reminds me of the younger toby
Production-wise, this album sounds VERY similar to George Strait's "Honkytonkville". . .i wonder if it was the same producer
also, just fyi, Toby wrote every song on the album . . . maybe thats why its so good
Production-wise, this album sounds VERY similar to George Strait's "Honkytonkville". . .i wonder if it was the same producer
also, just fyi, Toby wrote every song on the album . . . maybe thats why its so good
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DeactiveCarib
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May 16, 2005, 2:46PM
Outspoken Toby Keith shakes up business side of music industry
By JOHN GEROME
Associated Press
NASHVILLE, Tenn. — He's tangled with Peter Jennings and the Dixie Chicks over his music, criticized the media for its coverage of the Iraq war, tweaked the Country Music Association over awards snubs and threatened to flee his record label.
Associated Press
Toby Keith's latest album, Honkytonk University, is in stores today.
Keith was at the Country Music Television offices last week to promote Honkytonk University, his new CD out Tuesday, the same day he's up for the Academy of Country Music's Entertainer of the Year award.
At 6-foot-4, the former oil field worker, rodeo hand and semipro football player doesn't so much enter an office as take it over. He's candid and talkative and doesn't seem to mind stepping on toes — anyone's.
This day, he's still sore about a February report in Rolling Stone magazine that referred to him as "the king of ultra-patriotic country" and said his 2004 concert tour — which brought in $27.7 million, second only to Shania Twain in country music — earned "mostly red state dollars."
"The truth is — and we looked it up — we made a lot more money in the blue states," says Keith, 43, wearing a weathered straw cowboy hat and yellow Western shirt. "We did more shows in the red states, but we made a lot more cash in the blue states."
Keith feels he's been unfairly portrayed by the media and his critics as a hardcore right winger. While he's backed the American troops in his songs and supported President Bush's re-election, he describes himself as a conservative Democrat who doesn't always agree with the administration.
Back in Oklahoma where he and his wife of 21 years, Tricia, live with their three children, he's campaigned for Democratic candidates including Gov. Brad Henry.
"I get brushed with this big, gigantic red, white and blue brush. But I don't mind," he says. "I look good in red, white and blue."
Keith's star shines brighter than most country artists, and he'll be the first to tell you so. He's sold about 25 million albums with a sound rooted in the whiskey halls and beer joints of the Southwest.
Unlike most his peers, he writes just about everything he records. He says he can't imagine sifting through hundreds of songs to find a dozen or so that he likes and that reflect his personality. His hits include the hawkish anthem Courtesy of the Red, White and Blue (The Angry American) — a song inspired by his father's death in a car accident in 2000 as well the 9-11 terrorist attacks — the boozy I Love This Bar, the patriotic American Soldier and the chest-thumping How Do You Like Me Now?
The new album, Honkytonk University, has a harder country edge. There's an old-school duet with his musical hero Merle Haggard, She Ain't Hooked on Me No More, and a mid-tempo tune called Big Blue Note about a guy who finally comes to peace with a Dear John letter. The second single, As Good As I Once Was, is a rumination on growing older and wiser.
The release of that single symbolizes Keith's frustration with his record company.
He left Mercury Records in 1999 because he was upset with the way his music was being handled. He went to DreamWorks, then an independent label, and became a superstar. Last year Dreamworks was acquired by Universal Music Group Nashville, which has Mercury under its umbrella.
"As fate would have it, in the end the little independent label I'm on that's $27 million in the hole when I walk in and it sells for $100 million four years later because of what we accomplish — who do they sell to? I go right back to the hell hole I was in at first."
Keith said he approached things with an open mind but ran into trouble with the single. He wanted As Good As I Once Was to be the first one for radio; the folks at Universal, he says, thought it was too risky and chose the title cut.
"I had put out four or five albums without one A&R meeting. We put out what we wanted and it worked. So why would I have to change?" he says. "At this point in my career I'm not going to put up with it."
While he won't rule out a distribution deal with the music giant, Keith said, "Universal knows where they stand. I've got one more album (to fulfill his contract). After that, the next album is going to be on my label — period."
Universal Music Group Nashville declined to comment Monday, but Billboard magazine reported that at the March radio industry conference where Keith made his remarks, UMGN co-chairman Luke Lewis said, "To (Keith) I say, 'Good luck.' The track record of artists running record labels is not that good."
Asked last week about Lewis' comment, Keith quipped, "Ask him if he wants to bet paychecks."
By starting his own label, Keith wants to move closer to the business side of music and, perhaps, farther from the artist side. He says he'll focus on signing songwriters, whom he believes are the forgotten backbone of country music.
"I'm trying to bring the song back and make songwriters into artists more so," he said. "The industry has forgot the song itself. They try to find the song and then attach it to a pretty face so it works on video."
What you probably won't find Keith doing, despite his strong opinions, is entering politics.
"I couldn't tick off the line. My dad called it 'glad-handing' — walk up and smile and shake their hand whether you like them or not. If I don't like you, I don't like you. I don't want to come up and shake your hand."
Outspoken Toby Keith shakes up business side of music industry
By JOHN GEROME
Associated Press
NASHVILLE, Tenn. — He's tangled with Peter Jennings and the Dixie Chicks over his music, criticized the media for its coverage of the Iraq war, tweaked the Country Music Association over awards snubs and threatened to flee his record label.
Associated Press
Toby Keith's latest album, Honkytonk University, is in stores today.
Keith was at the Country Music Television offices last week to promote Honkytonk University, his new CD out Tuesday, the same day he's up for the Academy of Country Music's Entertainer of the Year award.
At 6-foot-4, the former oil field worker, rodeo hand and semipro football player doesn't so much enter an office as take it over. He's candid and talkative and doesn't seem to mind stepping on toes — anyone's.
This day, he's still sore about a February report in Rolling Stone magazine that referred to him as "the king of ultra-patriotic country" and said his 2004 concert tour — which brought in $27.7 million, second only to Shania Twain in country music — earned "mostly red state dollars."
"The truth is — and we looked it up — we made a lot more money in the blue states," says Keith, 43, wearing a weathered straw cowboy hat and yellow Western shirt. "We did more shows in the red states, but we made a lot more cash in the blue states."
Keith feels he's been unfairly portrayed by the media and his critics as a hardcore right winger. While he's backed the American troops in his songs and supported President Bush's re-election, he describes himself as a conservative Democrat who doesn't always agree with the administration.
Back in Oklahoma where he and his wife of 21 years, Tricia, live with their three children, he's campaigned for Democratic candidates including Gov. Brad Henry.
"I get brushed with this big, gigantic red, white and blue brush. But I don't mind," he says. "I look good in red, white and blue."
Keith's star shines brighter than most country artists, and he'll be the first to tell you so. He's sold about 25 million albums with a sound rooted in the whiskey halls and beer joints of the Southwest.
Unlike most his peers, he writes just about everything he records. He says he can't imagine sifting through hundreds of songs to find a dozen or so that he likes and that reflect his personality. His hits include the hawkish anthem Courtesy of the Red, White and Blue (The Angry American) — a song inspired by his father's death in a car accident in 2000 as well the 9-11 terrorist attacks — the boozy I Love This Bar, the patriotic American Soldier and the chest-thumping How Do You Like Me Now?
The new album, Honkytonk University, has a harder country edge. There's an old-school duet with his musical hero Merle Haggard, She Ain't Hooked on Me No More, and a mid-tempo tune called Big Blue Note about a guy who finally comes to peace with a Dear John letter. The second single, As Good As I Once Was, is a rumination on growing older and wiser.
The release of that single symbolizes Keith's frustration with his record company.
He left Mercury Records in 1999 because he was upset with the way his music was being handled. He went to DreamWorks, then an independent label, and became a superstar. Last year Dreamworks was acquired by Universal Music Group Nashville, which has Mercury under its umbrella.
"As fate would have it, in the end the little independent label I'm on that's $27 million in the hole when I walk in and it sells for $100 million four years later because of what we accomplish — who do they sell to? I go right back to the hell hole I was in at first."
Keith said he approached things with an open mind but ran into trouble with the single. He wanted As Good As I Once Was to be the first one for radio; the folks at Universal, he says, thought it was too risky and chose the title cut.
"I had put out four or five albums without one A&R meeting. We put out what we wanted and it worked. So why would I have to change?" he says. "At this point in my career I'm not going to put up with it."
While he won't rule out a distribution deal with the music giant, Keith said, "Universal knows where they stand. I've got one more album (to fulfill his contract). After that, the next album is going to be on my label — period."
Universal Music Group Nashville declined to comment Monday, but Billboard magazine reported that at the March radio industry conference where Keith made his remarks, UMGN co-chairman Luke Lewis said, "To (Keith) I say, 'Good luck.' The track record of artists running record labels is not that good."
Asked last week about Lewis' comment, Keith quipped, "Ask him if he wants to bet paychecks."
By starting his own label, Keith wants to move closer to the business side of music and, perhaps, farther from the artist side. He says he'll focus on signing songwriters, whom he believes are the forgotten backbone of country music.
"I'm trying to bring the song back and make songwriters into artists more so," he said. "The industry has forgot the song itself. They try to find the song and then attach it to a pretty face so it works on video."
What you probably won't find Keith doing, despite his strong opinions, is entering politics.
"I couldn't tick off the line. My dad called it 'glad-handing' — walk up and smile and shake their hand whether you like them or not. If I don't like you, I don't like you. I don't want to come up and shake your hand."
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sonofabeach
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cmt is doing a listening party:
http://www.cmt.com/artists/az/keith_tob ... lbum.jhtml
im not a tk fan at all. but i did listen to it. i give it 2 stars.
not that there is anything wrong with it, but i'm tired of hearing him sing about the war, iraq, bagdad, osama, and so on and on and on and on...
http://www.cmt.com/artists/az/keith_tob ... lbum.jhtml
im not a tk fan at all. but i did listen to it. i give it 2 stars.
not that there is anything wrong with it, but i'm tired of hearing him sing about the war, iraq, bagdad, osama, and so on and on and on and on...
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DeactiveCarib
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there are really no songs at all that involve the war, iraq, or osama on this album. He does "give a shoutout to his boys in bagdad" on one song, but thats totally understandableA1A BOUND wrote:cmt is doing a listening party:
http://www.cmt.com/artists/az/keith_tob ... lbum.jhtml
im not a tk fan at all. but i did listen to it. i give it 2 stars.
not that there is anything wrong with it, but i'm tired of hearing him sing about the war, iraq, bagdad, osama, and so on and on and on and on...
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A1A BOUND
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yeah, you're right. i think he ruined it for me on his last two albums. i will agree with you, it is his best in a while. also, he is a little to arrogant for my taste.DsilCaribe wrote:there are really no songs at all that involve the war, iraq, or osama on this album. He does "give a shoutout to his boys in bagdad" on one song, but thats totally understandableA1A BOUND wrote:cmt is doing a listening party:
http://www.cmt.com/artists/az/keith_tob ... lbum.jhtml
im not a tk fan at all. but i did listen to it. i give it 2 stars.
not that there is anything wrong with it, but i'm tired of hearing him sing about the war, iraq, bagdad, osama, and so on and on and on and on...
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DeactiveCarib
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yeah, i can see your point about him being arrogant but that doesn't really bother me much. I think arrogance is something you need to suceed in the music business, and when you were shut down by the big man as many times as toby was in the past, you can only expect him to be arrogant now that he's made it. He still makes good music, and thats really all that matters to me.A1A BOUND wrote:yeah, you're right. i think he ruined it for me on his last two albums. i will agree with you, it is his best in a while. also, he is a little to arrogant for my taste.DsilCaribe wrote:there are really no songs at all that involve the war, iraq, or osama on this album. He does "give a shoutout to his boys in bagdad" on one song, but thats totally understandableA1A BOUND wrote:cmt is doing a listening party:
http://www.cmt.com/artists/az/keith_tob ... lbum.jhtml
im not a tk fan at all. but i did listen to it. i give it 2 stars.
not that there is anything wrong with it, but i'm tired of hearing him sing about the war, iraq, bagdad, osama, and so on and on and on and on...
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A1A BOUND
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true. at the same time, i have always heard kc is a big arrogant a**hole in person but he doesn't let it show in his music or when hes promoting his music. i remember a while back when all that stuff was going on between tk and the dixie chicks. kc was on the jimmy kimmel show and jimmy asked kenny what he thought about all that and he didnt say one way or the other. he just sat there with a smerk and jimmy got the hint and moved on. i like that.DsilCaribe wrote:yeah, i can see your point about him being arrogant but that doesn't really bother me much. I think arrogance is something you need to suceed in the music business, and when you were shut down by the big man as many times as toby was in the past, you can only expect him to be arrogant now that he's made it. He still makes good music, and thats really all that matters to me.A1A BOUND wrote:yeah, you're right. i think he ruined it for me on his last two albums. i will agree with you, it is his best in a while. also, he is a little to arrogant for my taste.DsilCaribe wrote:there are really no songs at all that involve the war, iraq, or osama on this album. He does "give a shoutout to his boys in bagdad" on one song, but thats totally understandableA1A BOUND wrote:cmt is doing a listening party:
http://www.cmt.com/artists/az/keith_tob ... lbum.jhtml
im not a tk fan at all. but i did listen to it. i give it 2 stars.
not that there is anything wrong with it, but i'm tired of hearing him sing about the war, iraq, bagdad, osama, and so on and on and on and on...
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sonofabeach
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what's he got 3 patriotic songs tops?
That did not ruin it for me. Heck Charlie Daniels has a hundred and I still like him.
btw, arrogance worked pretty good for Bochephus, imo one of the best country singers/entertainers ever, yes even better than his dad.
In a way I see Toby as today's Bochepus if there can be such a thing.
That did not ruin it for me. Heck Charlie Daniels has a hundred and I still like him.
btw, arrogance worked pretty good for Bochephus, imo one of the best country singers/entertainers ever, yes even better than his dad.
In a way I see Toby as today's Bochepus if there can be such a thing.
"It's crazy and it's different, but it's really bein' free"
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DeactiveCarib
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I can really only think of two: "American Soilder" which is really a good song, and "Courtesy of the Red White and Blue" which is a bit more contreversial. "Tailiban Song" isn't really patriotic, its hillarious is what it is. . . i mean if u cant find that funny, somethings wrong with usonofabeach wrote:what's he got 3 patriotic songs tops?
That did not ruin it for me. Heck Charlie Daniels has a hundred and I still like him.
btw, arrogance worked pretty good for Bochephus, imo one of the best country singers/entertainers ever, yes even better than his dad.
In a way I see Toby as today's Bochepus if there can be such a thing.
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sonofabeach
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no, more like the masterpieces that the DBT have all over the radio and video channelsJahfin wrote:You mean when he was cutting such masterpieces like "I Wanna Talk About Me"?sonofabeach wrote:I think his last 2 cds were not great just average but this seems to get back along the lines of what he was doing about 4 years ago.
. 
Last edited by sonofabeach on May 20, 2005 1:28 pm, edited 1 time in total.
"It's crazy and it's different, but it's really bein' free"
Not sure what my comment (which was meant totally in jest btw, thus the smileysonofabeach wrote:no, more like the masterpieces that the DBT have all over the radio and video channelsJahfin wrote:You mean when he was cutting such masterpieces like "I Wanna Talk About Me"?sonofabeach wrote:I think his last 2 cds were not great just average but this seems to get back along the lines of what he was doing about 4 years ago.
) has to do with the Drive-By Truckers but radio and video airplay doesn't a good or worthy artist make. I was commenting on how that particular Toby song isn't all that great, at least to my ears. Your mileage may vary.-
sonofabeach
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some people would call tk a bochephus wannabesonofabeach wrote:what's he got 3 patriotic songs tops?
That did not ruin it for me. Heck Charlie Daniels has a hundred and I still like him.
btw, arrogance worked pretty good for Bochephus, imo one of the best country singers/entertainers ever, yes even better than his dad.
In a way I see Toby as today's Bochepus if there can be such a thing.
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Allison
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LOVE Toby, love the new album, love his last few albums, and I honestly think his arrogance is part of his charm, odd as that may seem. Some of the stuff he says... he's just not afraid of sugar-coating anything - and I think that's great. Things like his quote in DsilCaribe's post, "Ask him if he wants to bet paychecks" - stuff like that just makes me smile and admire him in a way because those are the types of things that I'd want to say but wouldn't be able to/would be too afraid to.
I saw him in concert last September 2004 and will be seeing him again this July and on September 11 (which should be interesting, and I have front row tickets, too) and am really excited about it. He's GREAT in concert (not as good as JB, of course) and I'm REALLY looking forward to seeing him again. Great energy, good times, etc....
I saw him in concert last September 2004 and will be seeing him again this July and on September 11 (which should be interesting, and I have front row tickets, too) and am really excited about it. He's GREAT in concert (not as good as JB, of course) and I'm REALLY looking forward to seeing him again. Great energy, good times, etc....
Got a Caribbean soul I can barely control
and some Texas hidden here in my heart.....
and some Texas hidden here in my heart.....
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Toby Keith: A Honkytonk University Honors Grad (First of Two Parts)
Superstar Talks About His New Album, Duet With Haggard
By: Calvin Gilbert
E-mail this story to a friend.
(Richard McLaren)
Toby Keith celebrated this week's release of his latest album, Honkytonk University, with a series of free concerts for some of his biggest fans -- U.S. troops serving in Iraq. A few days before embarking on the USO tour taking him to other military installations in the Persian Gulf, German, Belgium and Cuba, the Oklahoma-born superstar sat down with CMT.com to talk about his new album.
Running Saturday (May 22), the second part of the interview centers on Keith's future plans, including the launch of his own record label.
The single, "Honkytonk U," is about your days playing in clubs. Can you remember the first time you heard a bar band playing one of your songs?
It would have been out on that Triple Play tour we did. Me, Shania and a guy named John Brannen came out on a promotion tour in early '93. ... I heard my song on the radio for the first time going through Bowling Green, Ky., on our way to the first show. Obviously, we were playing bars every night, so by the end of that six or eight-week run, we were seeing these bar bands every night that would open or come on back onstage after we were done playing. At one of those venues, it was probably on the East Coast -- Charlotte or somewhere -- there was a band that got back after us to finish the night out. By then, "Should've Been a Cowboy" was close to the Top 20 and becoming a big hit, so that was probably the first time I heard a bar band play one of my songs.
Was that a weird position to be in?
It was actually pretty neat because it was all surreal. It was happening so fast. You're a complete no-name in the industry. Nobody has any clue who you are except your label. And then they start saying, "This song may be a hit. This album's good. We're going to proceed with putting you out there and seeing whether you stick or not." And then you pull out of town, and they say, "We released it Monday." And you pull out of town the next Monday and you're driving through Kentucky on your first big tour bus ... sitting back in the back, you flip the stereo on and, boom, you come on. Then you get to the bar and hear a band play it -- and you've been in a band for so many years and played other people's songs -- it was all pretty surreal.
But it was an indication that things might work out for you.
Well, we knew we had an out-of-the-box hit. And that's probably half of winning the battle early on. You have to have that song.
Your albums are usually a combination of songs that could be convincingly sung by a bar band or another artist. But there are other songs that are hard to imagine anybody besides you doing. Is it safe to say the new album tends to steer away from those in-your-face songs?
I don't know. "As Good As I Once Was" and a couple of those "leavin'" songs -- "You Ain't Leavin (Thank God Are Ya)" and "She Left Me" -- are pretty in-your-face. But you know what? There's no mad science project that goes on. There's no hidden room or lab tests that go on. This is literally the way it happens: I write 10 or 15 songs a year. I call my producer up and say, "Where are we gonna record this year?" So if he says, "We're going to record in the Bahamas," we rent the studio, rent a hotel and let's go. We fly down everybody we want to play on the original tracks. We get there. "What's the first song?" I pull a guitar out of the case, I strum it and I say, "We might as well start right here." It could be alphabetical. It could be slows first, fasts second. It could be up-tempo early, we'll do the ballads later. No particular order. We may do a ballad and an up-tempo today. Whatever comes to mind, I do the 12 or 13 songs, and we're done with recording those. We very seldom ever go back and re-cut something because we didn't get it [in the studio]. We've done that a couple of times, but 95 percent of the time, we leave it just the way it is. ... Mix them down, sing a vocal on them, bring the harmony singers in, throw it out and it's done. It's that simple.
It seems like a very cohesive album this time around, though.
With the invention of the iPod, I probably have listened to more classic country in the last couple of years than I ever have. When I'm on my jet, I don't have anything else to do but just sit there, so I flip my music on and get it in my ears. Some of that probably bled through as far as tones and structure, but the lyric is pretty much me all the way through and through. The album ended up being core country, and "Honkytonk U" really sets the pace as the title cut.
At this point, you've hung with Haggard and Willie enough to be comfortable around them. But do you ever get nervous when you're about to play them a new song you've written?
I've played Willie lots of songs. We sit and pass songs back and forth a lot. I don't get to spend as much time with Hag. But the neat thing is that the two I picked out to take them, they both listened and they both were willing to record them with me. I felt that "Beer for My Horses" would be a hit for Willie, and I felt like "She Ain't Hooked on Me No More" would be something that Haggard would be interested in. Willie's had so many hits, but one of the neat stories to come out of that is that I was in Minnesota ... playing a concert, about the time that thing broke onto the charts that summer. He's had so many hits, but it had been years since he'd had a big No. 1 hit. ... So this thing's blowing up the charts, and they call and tell me it's only been out eight days and we're in the 20s or something [on the chart], and it's rockin'. It's blowing up everywhere. So I call him and tell him, and he goes, "Well, you know, Johnny Cash always said that there's nothing wrong with any of us that a hit song won't cure." And that's about all he said about it. Eight or nine weeks later, the thing is No. 1 and sits there for six weeks. So I call him and say, "How about our little record?" just to mess with him a little bit. He was still just, "Yeah, yeah. It's a good deal." So then I heard later that he was having to play it twice in his show every night. (laughs) So that was neat to know that the fans had appreciated what we'd done. ... Hopefully, before it's over, this Merle Haggard thing will be the same way because I miss hearing those guys on the radio.
Will the duet with Haggard definitely be released as a single?
I don't know that. That's too far down the road to look. "Beer for My Horses" was the third or fourth single off the album, so I'm still in the first single [of Honkytonk University], trying to get the second one released off this thing. Something will float to the top as the third single.
The studio musicians playing on the new album are pretty much the usual suspects, but the track Johnny Hiland plays on really jumps out. He's played guitar around Nashville for years in bar bands, but had you heard him play before the session for "She Left Me"?
Me and Sammy Hagar reciprocate. ... He played my Super Bowl party, I went and played his Cabo Wabo [nightclub]. If I'm in Mexico, I swing back to his bar. When he's around, he comes by my places. ... Sammy had held a show up in Tahoe at his Tahoe Wabo, and he said, "I've got to introduce you to this guy." There were a lot of guitar players there. Ted Nugent, Alice in Chains, some of the Chili Peppers were there. He had a lot of players there to help him open that thing. The Grateful Dead -- some of those boys were there. We got to a point in the show where he said, "You've got to meet this guy." And out walks Johnny Hiland, and he just smoked everything he played. Backstage, he came up and said what a big fan he was. I said, "Man, why don't you come in and play on something?" I thought and thought and thought. I wanted to get him on this album. I promised him I would. So I thought back. Ten years ago, I wrote this thing called "We'd Still Be Together But She Left Me" with this really smokin' up-tempo. I thought, "I don't write many of them at this tempo. I want to give him something he can really fly on." We called him in, and he played on it. He's an incredible talent. People are going to know who he is in the years to come."
Superstar Talks About His New Album, Duet With Haggard
By: Calvin Gilbert
E-mail this story to a friend.
(Richard McLaren)
Toby Keith celebrated this week's release of his latest album, Honkytonk University, with a series of free concerts for some of his biggest fans -- U.S. troops serving in Iraq. A few days before embarking on the USO tour taking him to other military installations in the Persian Gulf, German, Belgium and Cuba, the Oklahoma-born superstar sat down with CMT.com to talk about his new album.
Running Saturday (May 22), the second part of the interview centers on Keith's future plans, including the launch of his own record label.
The single, "Honkytonk U," is about your days playing in clubs. Can you remember the first time you heard a bar band playing one of your songs?
It would have been out on that Triple Play tour we did. Me, Shania and a guy named John Brannen came out on a promotion tour in early '93. ... I heard my song on the radio for the first time going through Bowling Green, Ky., on our way to the first show. Obviously, we were playing bars every night, so by the end of that six or eight-week run, we were seeing these bar bands every night that would open or come on back onstage after we were done playing. At one of those venues, it was probably on the East Coast -- Charlotte or somewhere -- there was a band that got back after us to finish the night out. By then, "Should've Been a Cowboy" was close to the Top 20 and becoming a big hit, so that was probably the first time I heard a bar band play one of my songs.
Was that a weird position to be in?
It was actually pretty neat because it was all surreal. It was happening so fast. You're a complete no-name in the industry. Nobody has any clue who you are except your label. And then they start saying, "This song may be a hit. This album's good. We're going to proceed with putting you out there and seeing whether you stick or not." And then you pull out of town, and they say, "We released it Monday." And you pull out of town the next Monday and you're driving through Kentucky on your first big tour bus ... sitting back in the back, you flip the stereo on and, boom, you come on. Then you get to the bar and hear a band play it -- and you've been in a band for so many years and played other people's songs -- it was all pretty surreal.
But it was an indication that things might work out for you.
Well, we knew we had an out-of-the-box hit. And that's probably half of winning the battle early on. You have to have that song.
Your albums are usually a combination of songs that could be convincingly sung by a bar band or another artist. But there are other songs that are hard to imagine anybody besides you doing. Is it safe to say the new album tends to steer away from those in-your-face songs?
I don't know. "As Good As I Once Was" and a couple of those "leavin'" songs -- "You Ain't Leavin (Thank God Are Ya)" and "She Left Me" -- are pretty in-your-face. But you know what? There's no mad science project that goes on. There's no hidden room or lab tests that go on. This is literally the way it happens: I write 10 or 15 songs a year. I call my producer up and say, "Where are we gonna record this year?" So if he says, "We're going to record in the Bahamas," we rent the studio, rent a hotel and let's go. We fly down everybody we want to play on the original tracks. We get there. "What's the first song?" I pull a guitar out of the case, I strum it and I say, "We might as well start right here." It could be alphabetical. It could be slows first, fasts second. It could be up-tempo early, we'll do the ballads later. No particular order. We may do a ballad and an up-tempo today. Whatever comes to mind, I do the 12 or 13 songs, and we're done with recording those. We very seldom ever go back and re-cut something because we didn't get it [in the studio]. We've done that a couple of times, but 95 percent of the time, we leave it just the way it is. ... Mix them down, sing a vocal on them, bring the harmony singers in, throw it out and it's done. It's that simple.
It seems like a very cohesive album this time around, though.
With the invention of the iPod, I probably have listened to more classic country in the last couple of years than I ever have. When I'm on my jet, I don't have anything else to do but just sit there, so I flip my music on and get it in my ears. Some of that probably bled through as far as tones and structure, but the lyric is pretty much me all the way through and through. The album ended up being core country, and "Honkytonk U" really sets the pace as the title cut.
At this point, you've hung with Haggard and Willie enough to be comfortable around them. But do you ever get nervous when you're about to play them a new song you've written?
I've played Willie lots of songs. We sit and pass songs back and forth a lot. I don't get to spend as much time with Hag. But the neat thing is that the two I picked out to take them, they both listened and they both were willing to record them with me. I felt that "Beer for My Horses" would be a hit for Willie, and I felt like "She Ain't Hooked on Me No More" would be something that Haggard would be interested in. Willie's had so many hits, but one of the neat stories to come out of that is that I was in Minnesota ... playing a concert, about the time that thing broke onto the charts that summer. He's had so many hits, but it had been years since he'd had a big No. 1 hit. ... So this thing's blowing up the charts, and they call and tell me it's only been out eight days and we're in the 20s or something [on the chart], and it's rockin'. It's blowing up everywhere. So I call him and tell him, and he goes, "Well, you know, Johnny Cash always said that there's nothing wrong with any of us that a hit song won't cure." And that's about all he said about it. Eight or nine weeks later, the thing is No. 1 and sits there for six weeks. So I call him and say, "How about our little record?" just to mess with him a little bit. He was still just, "Yeah, yeah. It's a good deal." So then I heard later that he was having to play it twice in his show every night. (laughs) So that was neat to know that the fans had appreciated what we'd done. ... Hopefully, before it's over, this Merle Haggard thing will be the same way because I miss hearing those guys on the radio.
Will the duet with Haggard definitely be released as a single?
I don't know that. That's too far down the road to look. "Beer for My Horses" was the third or fourth single off the album, so I'm still in the first single [of Honkytonk University], trying to get the second one released off this thing. Something will float to the top as the third single.
The studio musicians playing on the new album are pretty much the usual suspects, but the track Johnny Hiland plays on really jumps out. He's played guitar around Nashville for years in bar bands, but had you heard him play before the session for "She Left Me"?
Me and Sammy Hagar reciprocate. ... He played my Super Bowl party, I went and played his Cabo Wabo [nightclub]. If I'm in Mexico, I swing back to his bar. When he's around, he comes by my places. ... Sammy had held a show up in Tahoe at his Tahoe Wabo, and he said, "I've got to introduce you to this guy." There were a lot of guitar players there. Ted Nugent, Alice in Chains, some of the Chili Peppers were there. He had a lot of players there to help him open that thing. The Grateful Dead -- some of those boys were there. We got to a point in the show where he said, "You've got to meet this guy." And out walks Johnny Hiland, and he just smoked everything he played. Backstage, he came up and said what a big fan he was. I said, "Man, why don't you come in and play on something?" I thought and thought and thought. I wanted to get him on this album. I promised him I would. So I thought back. Ten years ago, I wrote this thing called "We'd Still Be Together But She Left Me" with this really smokin' up-tempo. I thought, "I don't write many of them at this tempo. I want to give him something he can really fly on." We called him in, and he played on it. He's an incredible talent. People are going to know who he is in the years to come."
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lookingat40
- I need two more boat drinks
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- Location: winston salem, NC
I got the new cd yesterday and listened to it about 3 times...I love'd the first few songs, especially the one with Merle Haggard but the ballads bogged it down...By the way...anyone besides me notice how much he looks like David Allan Coe did at the same age? I know Coe fans hate it when I say it, but I think the two of them have a lot in common musically...especially Coe's early country contributions.
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DeactiveCarib
- I Love the Now!
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