Blame It All on Garth

“Ain’t it funny how a melody/can bring back a memory/take ya to another place and time/completely change your state of mind.”

            “State of Mind”- Clint Black

Coming from me, it may sound odd that my favorite Christmas gift was a Garth Brooks box set. I’m the guy who repeatedly listens to Fiona Apple and drove 10 hours to New York to see Bjork. I think I even surprised a few people when I mentioned the box set was on my Christmas list (thanks Sis!). But, as the name of the set suggests, blame it all on my roots.

I grew up in Eastern Kentucky where the prevailing music was either hymns in church or country music on the radio. My earliest memories are of me surrounded by music. In retrospect, what’s surprising is that while my parents certainly influenced what music I was exposed to, the music I listened to was my music. Mine. I owned it. 

For every birthday, I got records. When my grandparents would give me a dollar, I couldn’t wait to get to Mack’s or the TG&Y to buy a 45. 45s could usually be had for a dollar and would give me a chance to get a taste of a little bit of everything. I kept them in what had been a gallon Neapolitan ice cream bucket. This let me carry them and my portable record player with me everywhere I went.

For clarification, I’m not talking me as a teenager or even a tween. This is me at 6 years old, with my Randy Travis, Reba, Judds, Don Williams, Ricky Skaggs, Gene Watson, Barbara Mandrell and the records of countless others literally dragging behind me throughout the house. I sang along. I learned every word, even when I had no idea what most of it meant. It became my escape.

It wasn’t until looking through the box set today that I realized it’s dedicated to Garth’s influences. His own music and the songs and artists that he says shaped his sound. Many of these were the records, then eventually tapes and CDs, that were my childhood. While reading song titles and artist’s names, I was taken right back to Harlan County. Some of them literally took my breath away.

Just the recollection of a few bars of “Don’t Close Your Eyes” had me back in the floor with my record player, watching the Epic Records logo spin and trying to drown out the sounds of fighting in the other room. “Digging Up Bones” had me driving to Martin’s Fork Lake and remembering the first time I heard Randy Travis. Garth’s version of “Shameless” reminded me of having bought the Billy Joel “Storm Front” tape at the flea market and surprising my mom when I already knew every word when Garth’s version came on WFSR. It went on to become her favorite Garth song.

So, I’m spending today thinking about Wynonna and Naomi, Tanya Tucker and Sawyer Brown, Charley Pride and maybe even George Jones. It’s bringing back a ton of really happy and occasionally painful memories, loads of which I’d completely forgotten. But, just a quick scroll through my memory bank of that ice cream bucket of 45s and as Trisha sang, “even if the whole world has forgotten, the song remembers when”.