Alabama Stories

(written by Randy Owen)

Alabama (#1, 1980)

In one form or another, the four guys who made up the group Alabama had been playing music for well over a decade before they started becoming noticed. By the end of the 1970s, they had worked their way from small gigs around their Fort Payne, Alabama home to being the house band at The Bowery, one of Myrtle Beach, South Carolina’s hottest clubs. Though not starving to death, the group wasn’t rolling in the chips either. They didn’t have a major record deal, nationally they were unknown, and the timing for a country band making it in Nashville seemed completely wrong. It appeared that the boys were about 40 years too late.

The fact was that when country music fans thought of a country music group, they didn’t think of four guys playing instruments and singing. At that time successful groups were limited to quartets like the Statler Brothers or the Oak Ridge Boys, and bands consisted of the musicians who played behind the big stars. When asked to name their favorite band, most country fans would just pick the men who backed up their favorite solo acts, such as Merle Haggard’s “Strangers” and Buck Owens’ “Buckaroos.”

During that period, the Music City establishment thought little about signing country bands. Most producers and executives had never worked with a real band. Groups like the Texas Playboys and the Golden West Cowboys were just a part of the distant past, a vague memory from years gone by. Solo stars had dominated country music for decades, and most critics thought individual acts would continue to drive the genre well into the next century. Occasionally, a group might manage a fluke hit (such as the Charlie Daniels Band’s “The Devil Went Down to Georgia”), but it was thought that no group would ever have the power to chart consistently. It just couldn’t be done in these modern times. Country wasn’t like rock. The country fans wanted their stars one-on-one. That was about to change.

RCA first took note of Alabama when the band took a self-penned song “My Home’s in Alabama” into the Billboard Top 20 in early 1980. The company was impressed that an unknown band was able to notch a fair-sized hit on the small, independent MDJ label. Most record executives in town simply dismissed the accomplishment, but RCA decided to check into this group a bit further. Unannounced, a couple of the label’s executives went down to Myrtle Beach to catch Alabama’s stage show at the Bowery. They paid special attention to the guys’ unique mix of old country and ‘60s rock influences and noticed favorably the positive response that hardcore country fans were giving to the band’s country/rock blend. RCA decided to take a chance and sign the group.

Using veteran producer Harold Shedd, RCA put the boys in the studio and picked through their music, looking for anything that might be commercial enough to place Alabama in the top ten. One of the songs that RCA thought had potential was a tune that the group’s lead singer Randy Owen had put together a few years earlier called “Tennessee River.” Owen had composed the piece centered around his observations of “Trade Day” in Scottsboro, Alabama. Folks from all over the region would gather for a “First Monday” flea market event. Randy sensed a carnival atmosphere at the proceedings, and the song he wrote captured this jubilant spirit. In order to get to Scottsboro, the trip from Owen’s home in Fort Payne took the singer by the Tennessee River and past Lookout Mountain. Working these well-known settings into the song’s hook line, he finished three verses and turned it over to fellow band member Jeff Cook. Jeff was the group’s fiddle player and he arranged a hot rocking fiddle bridge that brought the song together.

In the studio, the boys recorded ”Tennessee River” two different ways. The longer version was used on their first album, and the alternate take threw out the second verse and tightened the song in preparation for a single release (although Randy Owen thought the removal of the second verse disrupted the continuity of the storyline). The record shipped one month after it had been cut, and RCA and the boys waited to see if country radio was ready for a country band.

On the last day of May, 1980, “Tennessee River” surfaced on the Billboard country chart. At that time Ronnie Milsap was holding down number one. Less than a month before, even pop singer Debby Boone had taken a song to the top. There would be no confusing what Alabama was doing with either Milsap, Boone, Kenny Rogers, Barbara Mandrell, Eddie Rabbitt, Anne Murray and the other “countrypolitan” artists. What gave RCA some hope that Alabama’s debut single would do well was the crowd which had made Hank Williams, Jr.’s Dixie rock so popular might also be caught up in Alabama’s sound.

Williams probably did pave the way for Alabama. Yet his music was actually harder than the stuff the boys were playing. Hank Jr. was closer to rock than the new RCA act but because they were a real band, many older listeners initially perceived that Alabama was simply a rock act trying to make it in country music. This was what RCA had feared would doom the group. However, their energetic, high-caliber music won a multitude of fans of all ages and the initial “carpetbagger” opinion of the guys never gained much footing. Alabama was destined to make plenty of country music history in the years to come.

“Tennessee River” started slowly. At a time when many records were hitting their peak within seven or eight weeks of release, this single was still working its way up Billboard’s country chart well over two months later. However the long wait proved fruitful when Alabama reached the #1 position on August 16, 1980, and started the ball rolling toward their career mark of 33 Billboard chart-toppers (fifth most in history). The group even logged ten additional singles that topped charts other than Billboard, for a grand total of 43.

Along the way, the group notched 21 consecutive #1 hits, a record that still stands today and will likely never be broken. Alabama is the most-awarded act in country music history, reportedly having won over 200 awards. They were named “Entertainer of the Year” for three consecutive years (1982-84) by the Country Music Association, and won that same trophy five years in a row (1982-86) from the Academy of Country Music. In 1989 the ACM also selected the group as “Artist of the Decade.” Alabama achieved the industry’s highest honor in 2005 when they were inducted into the Country Music Hall of Fame during their first year of eligibility.

Through the music of Alabama, a younger crowd began to tune in country stations. There can be little doubt that the huge growth of country radio in the 1980s was created in no small part by the explosion of this band’s “edgier” sound and tremendous popularity. Because of Alabama’s success, other country groups began to spring up and acts such as Restless Heart, Exile, Diamond Rio, Lonestar, Sawyer Brown, Rascal Flatts, Shenandoah and others got their opportunities to spend some time in the spotlight. While the move toward country groups didn’t supplant the solo acts altogether, it did make a huge dent in their control of the genre.

Alabama’s first RCA release, “Tennessee River,” dramatically changed the course of country music. The “country band,” long just a product of local dance halls, would again become a major force in the country music industry. With the insurgence of these young, driven musicians, a huge flow of new blood and fans would pour into Nashville-based music. The average age of the country music buyer would move downward as record and product sales spiraled upward. Building on their first #1 hit, Alabama resurrected the country band and changed the face of country music more dramatically than anything since Elvis and the rockabilly movement of the 1950s, and in the long run was probably even a more lasting influence.