Thank You, Country Music

By Marty Smith

Country Boy Casserole

Most every respectable country music song fits my life in some fashion or other.

From my earliest memories of song, great southern music always seemed to apply well to personal convictions reared on a beef cattle farm in southwest Virginia by a no-nonsense daddy and a God-fearing momma, built bail-by-bail throughout adolescence in dusty hayfields and solidified by more than a decade spent on a relentless road between Charlotte and San Francisco and back again.

The City of New Orleans. The Gambler. Highwayman. All the Gold in California. Angel of the Morning. Who’s Gonna Fill Their Shoes. Seven Spanish Angels. Roll On 18-wheeler. These are songs about love and life and hard work, yarn spun from empty whiskey bottles and the road less traveled.

They're about strife and struggle, and triumph over both. They chronicle life's fundamental truths. They aren't frivolous.

There is plenty of frivolity in modern country music, but several of today’s stars are upholding the standard set by the legends, guys like today’s Outlaw Quartet -- Jamey Johnson, Randy Houser, Josh Thompson and my buddy Eric Church. Zac Brown deserves mention in that group, too. He ain't outlaw, but he sure as sugar did it his own way.

Brad Paisley gets it. Dierks, too. Tim McGraw and Jason Aldean cut good songs by good writers.

As I write this I’m somewhere over Georgia at 38,000 feet, ear buds hammering Houser’s “Whistlin’ Dixie” loud enough to block the scream of the engines. With this song, Houser added well to the catalogue of country anthems for the what-you-see-is-what-you-get crowd, unafraid to get its hands dirty; those that appreciate a foundation and ancestry rooted in simple-man self-confidence.

Listening to it reminds me why I love country music -- and why I'm so thankful for it.

As far as I’m concerned, though, nobody says it like Church says it. Eventually, country radio and whomever it is that votes on these random awards shows will cast aside political gain, wake up and appreciate his excellence. The wave is coming. Trust me. He is, from my perspective, unparalleled as a songwriter and performer.

I’ve learned much from him about self-confidence and intuition. No one will ever convince me that Sinners Like Me isn’t the greatest album ever recorded in any genre in any era. I have my reasons. That record was there when I needed it.

That’s the beauty of music. When you need it it’s there. Even if everyone else deserts you, music is staunch. It is your voice when you don’t know what to say. It is your sounding board when you need to vent. It is comfort. It is solace. It is inspiration. It is revelation.

I can be fury. It can be rage.

The same song can carry completely different meanings for different people.

Knowing who you are takes serious guts. Accepting it is an admission. It is tearing down vulnerabilities and accepting quirks. It is the willingness to forgive those that question your particulars. It takes most folks decades. Those that know quickly in life are truly blessed. With that admission comes unshakable confidence.

Country music is helping cultivate that admission in me.

I went through the rock stage and the rap stage and the alternative stage, and I still appreciate greatly each of those genres of music. I still go bananas at weddings when Poison and Jovi and Vanilla Ice and John Denver hit the speaker. I consider Ice Cube and Eminem and Chuck D and Metallica and Justin Timberlake and Usher among the world’s most talented musicians.

But country is different, probably because it’s where I’m from and who I am and what I’ve lived. And as I age, and engage in each new life experience, there’s a song that speaks directly to my life in that moment.

It may buoy me when I’m treading water. It may embrace me when I’m alone. It may be a mirror of reflection on a rich, blessed past. It may be the fuse to ignite a hell of a party.

And for that, I am thankful.

The Boomerang Effect

By Marty Smith
Country Boy Casserole


It is a common theme among jaded corporate types, stuck in a rut, staring down the cold reality of middle-age: "When I was younger, I couldn't wait to get out of there. Now, all I want to do is get back home."


I'm not sure it's as much about location as it is the prospect of simplicity, the foggy recollection of a wistful youth bursting with promise and devoid of professional or financial stress.


It's about recapturing a moment when a smile from a girl buckled your knees and nearly bowled you over with butterflies. It's about rolling down the highway with your daddy in that ol' blue Ford pickup truck at dusk, windows down, the cab brimming with the smell of fresh-cut hay and a fresh-lit Marlboro Light.


It's about following an old John Deere down a rural route at 20 mph, and being just fine with it. It's about the sweet disappointment that accompanied the conclusion of the Dukes of Hazzard, and the dreaded Dallas theme song that signaled bedtime.


I think about that life often. For 22 years I lived it.


I was raised in rural Southwest Virginia, deep in the New River Valley in a farm town called Pearisburg. Just outside my front door was a respite-leg of the Appalachian Trail, where just up the hill and around the bend weary hikers found a bed and a meal at the Catholic church.


Pearisburg in the late 80's and early 90's was the simple life. There is tremendous richness in simplicity. We had it made. But like most kids we had no concept of our blessings. Brad Paisley sang it well in "Letter to Me" -- "at 17 it's hard to see past Friday night."


In small towns all over this country, fall Friday nights are magical, the social event. Pearisburg is no different. In fact, if a robber rolled into Pearisburg on a Friday night in October, he'd have it pretty good. The place is a ghost town. Every former and current Giles High Spartan from Newport to Eggleston to White Gate to Staffordsville filled Ragsdale Field for the Fellowship of the Vicarious Ones.


And most of the participants left their front doors unlocked.


We had a stop light and a Pizza Hut, and the two-mile middle-school-to-Hardee's-and-back loop around town was the track we cruised for hours on-end in search of entertainment, by way of prayers that any cute girl as bored as we were would pay us mind.

My momma cooked dinner every day, positioned the place-settings at 5 p.m., and we sat as a family every night at 6. We ate pot roast and fried okra and corn-on-the-cob as Dan Rather told us what was going on in places we couldn't find on a map.


Speaking of Rather, he may as well be a member of my family. I saw him every day of my life for as far back as I can remember, weekends not withstanding. On Saturday and Sunday we welcomed Bob Scheiffer into the house. Waylon Jennings and Willie Nelson and the Oak Ridge Boys and The Judds and Reba were all part of the family, too.


I was oblivious, couldn't see past the stop sign 100 yards from my driveway, literally or figuratively. Sure, I had big dreams. But in the midst of the small town life, big dreams seem unachievable. They're not. I'm living proof. I always wanted to be involved in professional sports, and here I am.

I am blessed beyond belief, and remember daily to appreciate the faith and experiences and relationships that built this life.

But as I ease through airport security checkpoints from coast-to-coast each week, I often think back to those Friday nights in Pearisburg, after a win and down on the riverbank with my buddies, when the biggest question facing me was whether that smile in the hallway would lead to a kiss.