Songoftheday 7/6/23 - Well me an' my lady had our first big fight, so I drove around till I saw the neon light...

 

 

"The Good Stuff" - Kenny Chesney

from the album No Shoes, No Shirt, No Problems (2002)

Billboard Hot 100 peak: #22 (two weeks)

Weeks in the Top-40: 12

 

Today's song comes from country star Kenny Chesney, who landed his fifth crossover top-40 hit on Billboard magazine's Hot 100 with "Young" in the spring of 2002. The second single from Kenny's No Shoes, No Shirt, No Problems album was the parable ballad "The Good Stuff". Written by Craig Wiseman and Jim Collins, the song finds Chesney playing the part of a man who just had a fight with his other half and goes to the bar to drink away his anger (hence "the good stuff"). The bartender sees him and then plays counselor, even bringing out a carton of milk that is of course in every hillbilly bar (for all those "white Russians"). The chorus has Kenny rattling off good memories of the relationship. The final verse turns the story over to the bartender, who recounts his own wife who had passed on, and that touch is the best part of the song. It's a touch didactic but not overly so, and Kenny's aw shucks charm doesn't weigh it down. All and all it's a nice story song that does have the list thing going without being the branding ilk that was starting to infiltrate the genre. The music video has Kenny recreating the plot of the song with his manager as the bartender, cut with "studio shots" of making the song....

"The Good Stuff" became Kenny's longest stay at #1 on Billboard's Country Airplay chart, spending seven weeks at the top (which he matched only once since), while making it to the top-40 on their all-genre Hot 100 in August of 2002.

Both Kenny and the album will be back to the series.

(7/10)

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Here's Kenny performing the song in concert...

Song of the day will be on vacation (like me) for a week, but I'll be back on the 17th with a rapper zeroing out.