Songoftheday 8/17/23 - When I walked in the band just started, the singer couldn't carry a tune in a bucket...
"Ten Rounds With Jose Cuervo" - Tracy Byrd
from the album Ten Rounds (2001)
Billboard Hot 100 peak: #26 (one week)
Weeks in the Top-40: 6
Today's song comes from Tracy Byrd, who grew up in the suburbs of the southeastern Texan city of Beaumont. Moving to that city for college, Tracy took up music, and eventually got himself signed to MCA Records in the early 1990s. Byrd released the first single from his self-titled debut album, the hokey neo-blues of "That's The Thing About A Memory", which popped on to Billboard magazine's Country Songs airplay chart for a few weeks getting to #71. That was followed by a cover of Johnny Paycheck's "Someone To Give My Love To", which had a lighter ballad sound that fit better on the radio, and Tracy just missed the Country top-40 at #42. But it would be the third try (thankfully that was the time labels would give artists multiple tries) that would catapult Byrd into the Nashville spotlight. "Holdin' Heaven", especially when it was given a "remix" that made it into the then-hot country bars that had two-step and line dancing, went all the way to #1 on the Country Songs list. The Tracy Byrd album went to #115 on the Billboard 200 sales tally, and #24 on the Country Albums chart, but sold steady enough to go gold, selling over a half million copies.
With that momentum, Tracy returned in 1994 with his sophomore effort, No Ordinary Man, which became his highest-charting album to date reaching #30 on the Billboard 200 and #3 on the Country Albums list, selling over two million records. All four of its singles reached the Country Songs top ten, with two of them making Billboard's "big chart", the Hot 100. "Watermelon Crawl", which got to #4 on country radio and #81 on the Hot 100, was like "Holdin Heaven", benefiting from another country-style "dance remix" for the bars, while the ballad "The Keeper Of The Stars", which won Song Of The Year and the Academy of Country Music Awards, spent two weeks at #2 on country radio and made it to #68 on the Hot 100.
However, while Byrd was a steady presence on country radio, it wasn't translating into the skyrocketing success other acts were seeing. He made three more studio album for MCA, and had at least one top ten country radio hit on each one, but they were more moderate hits (mind you, other acts would kill their mama for his success), and after a Keepers: Greatest Hits collection, he switched over to RCA.
Tracy's first single for RCA, "Put Your Hand In Mine", an attempt to recreate the magic from "Keeper Of The Stars", frustratingly stalled on the Country Songs chart at #11, though it did sneak onto the Hot 100 at #76. The It's About Time album, released in 1999, only spent a week on the Billboard 200 at #174 (and #20 on the Country Albums list).
But again, Byrd wasn't just let go, and his second set on RCA, Ten Rounds, was released in the summer of 2001. The lead single from the record, "A Good Way To Get On My Bad Side", which paired the singer up with neo-traditionalist Mark Chesnutt, disappointed by stalling at #21 on the Country Songs chart (and only "bubbling under" the Hot 100 at #121). It really wasn't surprising, since it seemed like such a "forced manliness" branding track. Tracy righted himself by going back to his love ballad wheelhouse with the follow-up, "Just Let Me Be In Love", which tapped into the Latin Explosion in the pop world (and was a better song anyway), which returned Byrd to the country top ten for the first time in four years at #9, while placing on the Hot 100 at #64.
For the third single (ironically, like "Holdin' Heaven"), Tracy found himself with one of his biggest hits thanks again to the line dancing crowd. "Ten Rounds With Jose Cuervo", written by Nashville pros Casey Beathard, Marla Cannon, and Michael Heeney, was a midtempo comic breakup to bar romp that had counting shots as the hook. The lyrics have Tracy singing about being a sourpuss on entering the sad joint, but with each drink of tequila his inhibitions and his mood lighten up. Though its unsure whether its just in his mind, Byrd keeps the spirits up to make me believe his luck was truly turning around.
"Ten Rounds With Jose Cuervo" became Tracy's first, and so far only, single to reach the top-40 on Billboard's Hot 100 in September of 2002. The song also scored Tracy his second #1 country hit, tying the success of "Holding Heaven". The Ten Rounds album, released in July of 2001, didn't really capture the success the single did, taking three weeks on the Billboard 200 with a high of #119, while getting to #12 on the Country Albums list.
The following year, Byrd came back with would assumedly was going to be the first single from his next album "Lately (Been Dreamin' 'Bout Babies)", but when the song stalled out at #38 on the Country Songs chart it wasn't even included (and doesn't even show on streaming services). When the next album The Truth About Men arrived in 2003, the pushed single and title track corralled backing vocals from A-lister Blake Shelton, B-lister duo Montgomery Gentry, and C-lister Andy Griggs, but the forced macho track had the same muted reception as "A Good Way..." did, stopping at #13 on the Country Songs chart and #77 on the Hot 100. It was followed by "Drinkin' Bone", another line-dance track, which scored Tracy's most recent top ten country hit at #7, and his last Hot 100 appearance at #60. The album did land his second top-40 ranking on the Billboard 200 at #33, while cresting at #5 on the Country Albums list. He was shifted from RCA to affiliate BNA for a slapped-together Greatest Hits set that just had RCA hits and re-recorded older material. It did have a new song, "Revenge Of A Middle Age Woman", which is his latest top-40 country hit in 2004.
In 2006, Tracy put out Different Things on the indie Blind Mule label, which peaked at #165 on the Billboard 200 and #36 on the Country Albums chart. It spun off one charting single, "Cheapest Motel", at #55 on the Country Songs airplay list. After a long break from recording, Byrd returned with All American Texan, his most recent studio album. He released a Live From Billy Bob's concert record in 2019, and he continued to tour.
(8/10)
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And lastly, Byrd included a live version of the song on his Truth About Men album...
Up tomorrow: A fallen R&B angel has some feelings.
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