One Too Many Drinking Songs

One Too Many Drinking Songs

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Should Country artists show more responsibility in the songs they sing and the way they act?

Drinking songs perhaps more so in the past are somewhat stereotypical in country music with subjects like drowning one’s relationship problems and adultery.

Take for example “Just A Drink Away” recorded by Ernest Tubb in 1969 and written by Bobby Lewis and Billy Parker when he “pours” out his feelings:             

See that girl at the bar/ She just took my house and car/ And the little ones that meant the world to me/She gets wilder day by day/Now she's just a drink away/ Just a drink away from anyone but me/ So step up to the bar/ Makes no difference who you are/ You'll be welcome just as long as she can see/ That she's tearing out my heart/ Like she planned it from the start/ She's just a drink away from anyone but me.

Fast forward to Darius Rucker’s “Whiskey & You” from his 2010 album CHARLESTON, SC 1966 in which he sings:

Always there/ When my world starts closing in/ Something to hold / No matter how long it's bee n/ Gets me high / Then knocks me to the ground/ Soothes my mind/ And then begins to break me down.....Whiskey and you/ Ain't nothing I can do/ But come crawling back to / Whiskey and you

Nashville's worst ongoing trend tend to be songs that consist almost entirely of "how country I am, I drive a truck and I drink plenty of beer and whiskey in bars and drink moonshine on a pickup truck and having a good time.

With the U.S. national debt set to pass the $15 trillion mark and the UK having now reached the £1 trillion mark perhaps this “Niagara Falls of debt” is enough to drive anyone to drink especially the politicians.

Last year in America a story ran about a 19-year-old with a fake ID nearly beaten to death at a Tim McGraw show near Boston and 60 underage drinkers got arrested at a N.Y. State Brad Paisley show. At Darien Lake someone was found dead in the nearby pond. A police chief in Mansfield, Mass. was quoted as saying “Country shows used to be easy. Now they are not. Big problems in the parking lots”

Drunk after drunk were taken out at a Jaso Aldean/ Brad Paisley show last year at Gillette Stadium.

For Taylor Swift's 'Speak Now' tour the word is they have random drug-and-alcohol testing on the road for her crew as her tour will be strictly sober. Sources also said "All the dancers auditioning looked clean-cut as they wanted the right image to get the job." Yet who would imagine that even at Taylor Swift's shows there were arrests for underage drinking! Other reports have seeped across the pond regarding forty-four arrests at a Sawyer Brown lake party in Alabama with each arrest having a booze element surrounding it.

A year or more ago, a teen girl died after attending a Kenny Chesney tailgate bash near Boston. At some country tour stops the situation is apparently nearly out of control.

The heat = beer sales. So with temperatures rising over 100 in the hot American summer drunks in the parking lot before the show was becoming standard – “Just another American Saturday Night?”

After a Brad Paisley show on Saturday (July 23, 2011) he tweeted about the long list of drinkers and 14 other people arrested or cited for all kinds of disorderliness. "Quite a performance in Darien Lakes Saturday. We also played music," he tweeted, adding a link to the local newspaper's crime page with most of the names, ages and towns of all the people arrested.

People drink alcohol at concerts FACT but are they legally able too? There are a lot of young country fans in America but some pour vodka into their water bottles or smuggle beer under their miniskirts. They take the risk of getting into serious trouble and can spoil the day for other fans and it looks bad when they are “associated “ with ( like Football fans) and disappoint the artists they pay money to see.

Do Country Stars and the Industry set a Bad Example?

There are songs about booze and drink companies are sponsors so the money is important isn’t it?

Average Joe’s Entertainment’s Colt Ford launched his own signature liquor line in 2011, “Goodtime”, and aligned himself with the Georgia Distilling Company and United Distributors to produce Goodtime Moonshine (90 proof) and Goodtime.

Last year I watched an online Brad Paisley Soundcheck concert to promote his album THIS IS COUNTRY MUSIC. He could be seen taking a branded beer from probably someone planted in the audience showing the brand label clearly to the cameras.

When he came to the UK and played to a 17,000 crowd at London’s O2 Arena he encored (getting “stoned” you might say) with Ronnie Wood of the Rolling Stones and the help of Darius Rucker his hit crowd-pleasing song “Alcohol.” This was with bottles of branded alcohol being projected onto the large screens (see video). I therefore assume he ends his stateside shows with it too. -

Two times CMA Male Vocalist Blake Shelton loves his booze, and he doesn’t care who knows it! He hasn’t been bashful about his romance with alcohol. He is becoming just as famous for his drunken tweets as he is for his music. Blake tweets his “signature” “I’m so drunk…” messages and has said to CNN - “You know what? I drink alcohol and always will until I die and I don’t care if you like it or not.” Go ahead, tell ‘em how you really feel!” - I guess he’s honest!

In Blake’s song “Get Some” he sings – “ You get gas,You get beer,You get drunk,You get weird..... And everybody say, God Almighty it's Friday / Everybody get sideways to have a little fun/ Everybody's livin' “ .

The drinking spills over into 2012 on his current single “Drink On It” with its words - ’Let me buy another round /Girl I think you and I should just/ Drink on it /Put our heads together and think on it/ Maybe later on we can sleep on it/ But for right now/ Girl we just need to drink on it.

Do Dierks Bentley and his song / see video “Am I The Only One” influence the younger country demographic in America?

Am I the only one who wants to have fun tonight? / Is there anybody out there who wants to have a cold beer/ Kick it to the morning light/ If I have to raise hell all by myself/ I will but y'all, that ain't right/ It's time to get it on.

Jake Owen opens up on “Alone with You” with the lines: I don't see you laugh, you don't call me back but you kiss me when you're drunk / I don't know your friends, don't know where you've been why are you the one I want

Johnny Walker helps Justin Haigh walk the line in “ All My Best Friends Are Behind Bars”: Then a bartender showed me the secret to life, Was a smooth sippin whiskey and a handful of ice, And since then, it's all been downhill. Oh yeah, life is good

This year, Jerrod Niemann turned his successful ‘One More Drinkin’ Song’ into a mistletoe remix. In this gals and guys raise their red cups in a sing-a-long: But hey hey hey what's so wrong, with one more drinkin song, hold up your cups and sing along
to one more drinkin song ....and here's to bartenders tryin' to get paid while all of us are trying to get laid – Youtube

Yes the drinking songs continue to flow in 2012 as Eric Church scored his first #1 single last week with “Put A Drink In My Hand”. With its words: Boss man can shove that over time up his can, All I wanna do is put a drink in my hand, Fill it up I'll throw it down, I got a forty hour week worth of trouble to drown - He calls it "downright perfect as the theme song to a fun weekend” . I’m sure it will go down well on his 2012 arena tour, ERIC CHURCH: THE BLOOD, SWEAT & BEERS TOUR!

Drinkin’ songs weren’t just confined to male country artists last year , mother of two Ashton Shepherd let us know there’s nothing better than "Some beer on a boat on a Saturday,with a few good friends just floatin' away”

Grace Potter joined Kenny Chesney on CMA Song of the Year Nominee and current Grammy nominated "You and Tequila" written by Matraca Berg and Deana Carter with the songs protagonists admitting - Cause you and Tequila make me crazy/ Run like poison in my blood/ One more night could kill me, baby/ One is one too many, one more is never enough.

Sunny Sweeney’s single “Drinking Myself Single” depicted a woman who decides to have a night to herself, drinking, having affairs until she has eradicated her male lover , telling us: I'm gonna dress up, in my low-cut/ My tight blue jeans, I'm gonna stir somethin' up/ I'm gonna kiss all the boys 'til I kiss your memory goodbye/ Yeah, I'm a gonna drink myself single tonight/ A bottle of red, a bottle of white/ Which one will it be, I can't decide/ I guess I'll find out once I drink those bottles dry/ Yeah, I'm a gonna drink myself single tonight/I wanna find out what it's like/ to stagger in the house like you do every nigh.

Gwyneth Paltrow starred in the Country Strong soundtrack as a recovering alcoholic going through rehab. In real life Gwyneth who shot an advertisement for Martini back in 2003 last year told TV host Chelsea Handler she was 'a lush', and loved to drink. 'Do you drink regularly?' the talk show host asked. '”A lot, yeah,” she admitted. “Red wine is my favourite, but I’ll drink white, rosé... Guinness is my favourite beer. I like a dirty vodka martini. I’m just a lush, basically. 'Gwyneth Paltrow asking her former alcoholic friend, Robert Downey Jr, for tips about playing an alcoholic in her new movie Country Strong. She ended up hitting the bottle herself to get into character. “'You just get really drunk all the time. Which is awesome,” she told American television personality Rachael Ray.- 'At least I did anyway, it's not very professional. There's a Bloody Mary at 10am. and keep it going all day.'  [ Source - Daily Mail)

So are these songs merely harmless, reflecting on real life issues as country does?

Despite its grim subject matter, the country drinking song remains an institution, as integral to the fabric of the American nation as apple pie.

I guess Nashville songwriters will continue to pour out the drinkin' songs and the singers will keep on singin' em'.



Wild Shot Mezcal
(Toby Keith News)



This week Toby Keith sees his album CLANCY’S TAVERN back on top of the charts as his current viral hit single “Red Solo Cup.” was the most played jukebox song for this past 4 weeks. There are reports of empty shelves at retailers as consumers “prepare to party” by picking up the celebrated red cups whilst beverage distributors are doing their best to keep pace with demand.

Toby brought mescal (86.8 Proof); a cousin of Mexico's famous tequila, to America and it’s now available in 38 states and heralded in the beverage trade press. Toby told the Tennessean newspaper. "There is a void in the market place in getting this drink to the average person, so it seemed natural for me to start a business selling Toby Keith Mezcal"

Toby Keith Pours Wild Shot Mezcal - Video

So if America basks in another Keith Urban “Long Hot Summer” this year will the problem of under-age drinking just get worse and will it be seriously addressed by the country community?

The answer could well be - “Who cares”

Red solo cup, I fill you up, let’s have a party, let's have a party, I love you red solo cup, I lift you up, Proceed to party, proceed to PARTY!!!!!

100 Best Drinking Songs 

Spotify - Best Country Drinking Songs