Songs About Me
"Songs About Me"
Trace Adkins
I used to be addicted to "Politically Incorrect". I had my VCR set to tape it every night. Oh, I’d fast-forward past Bill Maher’s monologue, but I’d be fascinated by the meat of the show, wherein four people from different walks of life debated the issues of the day. People who told everybody they were smart, weren’t (like Gene Simmons!) And people you’d barely ever heard of, considered to be bumpkins, were actually quite reasonable, like Trace Adkins.
This guy seemed about seven feet tall. And a bit dangerous. But he didn’t just spout the right wing southern country position. He seemed like a guy you knew in passing in high school who’d become a big buddy at 35. I never forgot. And when I heard this track on my iPod, and enjoyed it so much, and reached down into my pocket to retrieve the device to find who’d done it, it brought a smile to my face, it was just RIGHT that Trace Adkins had done it. (A friend had recommended a bunch of country tracks, which I’d downloaded, that’s how it had gotten on my iPod to BEGIN WITH!)
Oh, there’s an intro off one of those Mellencamp records. Just after John’ big hits. When he started integrating all those other instruments. But soon thereafter, the electric guitar came forward and center and the band started to WAIL!
And, in a voice sans sweetness, more akin to speaking than singing Trace said:
I met a guy on the red eye
He spotted my guitar and said, ‘What do you do?’
I said ‘I sing for a living
Country music mixed with a little rock and a little blues’
That’s it. That’s the memo I missed. That the twang, that’s only a small ELEMENT of today’s country music. It’s really an amalgamation of all those influences that enraptured us back in the seventies. This is closer to the Allman Brothers than ANYTHING passed off as modern rock music.
He said, ‘I’m sorry but I’ve never been crazy
‘Bout that twang and trains and hillbilly thing
Whatever made you want to sing stuff like that?’
I’m cracking up just writing this. Because this is me. Except for the fact that I wouldn’t even bother to TALK to a dude who looked like a country music performer, unless he sat right next to me on the plane. I’m supposed to hate everything these people and their music STANDS FOR!
I just looked at him and laughed and said
‘Cause it’s songs about me and who I am
Songs about lovin’ and livin’
And good hearted women and family and God
Yeah, they’re all just songs about me, songs about me
When did the music become about SOMEONE ELSE? We used to listen to it because we IDENTIFIED WITH IT! It delineated our emotions. Do you live the life of a rapper? Britney Spears?
Oh, I could lose the point about God, but notice there’s no star attitude in the lyrics, it’s a conversation. The act and the potential fan are EQUALS!
And, when you listen to the rest of the song, you’ll find out the guy DOES COME TO THE SHOW, AND HE CONNECTS!
Will you connect?
Check it out: Trace Adkins – Songs About Me
And don’t put on your Wetlands hat. Your critical hat. Think about a summer Saturday afternoon, driving through the countryside with the top down, banging the dashboard along with the music.
"Every Mile A Memory"
Dierks Bentley
So I’m driving down Wilshire, listening to Sirius New Country, and I hear this RIFF!
I remember going to see that Prefontaine movie in Century City, with the Joe Walsh soundtrack. You know, COUNTY FAIR!
Drop all this, ignore everything I’m writing, if you’re unaware of "County Fair", check that out FIRST! Because Joe Walsh DID IT FIRST! The guitar crashing down like a wave, a TSUNAMI! And then the sweet dynamics. I think of the Oregon forest every time I hear it. These country boys, they’re just taking off from WHERE the classic rock artists started decades back. The interesting thing is the country boys are continuing down the road, whereas everybody else seems to have bailed, gone off in a different direction.
Anyway, "Every Mile A Memory" has an intimate intro akin to "Songs About Me", and then a guitar assault akin to a Skynyrd track, and then a vocal right out of Flash And The Pan’s "Walking In The Rain".
The retrospective lyrics, the changes, this just SOUNDS RIGHT!
Won’t change your life, but you’ll want to hear it AGAIN!
"Tequila Makes Her Clothes Fall Off"
Joe Nichols
If this were 1965, if we truly had Top Forty radio, "Tequila Makes Her Clothes Fall Off" would be one of the TOP TEN SONGS OF THE DECADE!
As it is, it went to number one on the country chart over a year ago, and I NEVER FUCKING HEARD IT UNTIL JUST NOW!
The contradiction of a song with lyrics like this making it to number one when everyone says the south is about god and family…leaves me scratching my head. God, this song might be TOO RACY FOR TOP FORTY RADIO!
She said I’m going out with my girlfriends
Margaritas at the Holiday Inn
Oh have mercy, my only thought
Was tequila makes her clothes fall off
Can’t you SEE IT! A GIRL’S NIGHT OUT! Not at the club in Manhattan, with the velvet rope and the bouncer, but the local watering hole, the local HOTEL!
But what happens when her clothes fall off? That’s the hidden meaning here. She gets fucked up on tequila and starts flirting and nine months later?
I told her put an extra layer on
I know what happens when she drinks Patron
Her closet’s missing half the things she bought
Yeah, tequila makes her clothes fall off
The extra layer conjures up long underwear in my brain, she’s got to have on something UNDERNEATH when she doffs her clothes, to PROTECT HER!
But it’s the reference to Patron that cracks me up. More creativity than in any Linkin Park song.
And then reinforcement of the concept. Yup, this woman gets drunk and ANYTHING can happen!
She’ll start by kicking out of her shoes
Lose an earring in her drink
Leave her jacket in the bathroom stall
Drop a contact down the sink
Come on, you know this girl. Gets just TWO sheets to the wind and it all starts to fall apart. Between the lost earring and the contact, I’m laughing. The minor injustices of everyday life. We’ve never heard about MADONNA losing a contact, but it’s happened to every lens wearer.
And now for the PIECE DE RESISTANCE!
Them pantyhose ain’t gonna last too long
If the deejay puts Bon Jovi on
She might come home in a tablecloth
Yeah, tequila makes her clothes fall off
If you don’t think pantyhose doesn’t have a sexual connotation then you’ve never visited a Yahoo group where that’s the point of FIXATION! And it’s one thing if you’re removing your pantyhose at HOME, at the end of the day. But if you lose them somewhere along the way… Well, you took them off to do WHAT?
And the Bon JOVI reference! Bon Jovi didn’t have to go country, he was ALREADY a fixture in the country world. Just like Gretchen Wilson said that "You Shook Me All Night Long" was on every jukebox in the south. Classic rock is a STAPLE! You don’t have to change for them, they’ve already embraced you. AC/DC will be NO MORE POPULAR if they include banjos on their next album, just like Bon Jovi has been rejected by country radio. You’ve got to stay true to yourself, that’s enough.
And then we’re past the specific evening, we’ve come to the point of reflection.
She can handle any champagne brunch
A bridal shower with Bacardi punch
Jello shooters full of Smirnoff
But tequila makes her clothes fall off
Everybody’s got some kind of alcohol they can’t drink. Something that takes them to a place they don’t want to and never should go. Rum? Fine. Vodka? O.K. TEQUILA??
She don’t mean nothing
She’s just havin’ fun
Tomorrow she’ll say oh what have I done
Her friends will joke about the stuff she lost
Yeah, tequila makes her clothes fall off
Oh, tequila makes her clothes fall off
Oh, tequila makes her clothes fall off
Getting fucked up and raging around is fun. Having sex is fun. You might giggle about it the day after, but you don’t want to TAKE IT BACK!
This is how relationships start. This is how babies are born. This is how reputations are ruined.
This scenario is played out every night in this great country of ours. There aren’t guys kicking girls to the curb, just members of the opposite sex rendezvousing at the club. Seeing where their lives and their behavior will take them.
"Tequila Makes Her Clothes Fall Off" is as American as apple pie. It is us. The fact that so many of our citizens have not heard it is deplorable. You will be enriched by "Tequila Makes Her Clothes Fall Off". It will remind you that we’re only here for a short time, and that you MIGHT AS WELL ENJOY THE RIDE!
