Songoftheday 4/11/24 - The sun is hot and that old clock is movin' slow and so am I, work day passes like molasses in wintertime but it's July...

 

 

"It's Five O'Clock Somewhere" - Alan Jackson and Jimmy Buffett

from the album Greatest Hits Vol. II (Alan Jackson, 2003)

Billboard Hot 100 peak: #17 (two weeks)

Weeks in the Top-40: 15

 

Today's song comes from Alan Jackson and Jimmy Buffett. Jackson had been a major force on country music radio through the 1990s and early 2000s, and his tenth studio album Drive in 2002 had spun off four big Nashville hits that crossed over to the top-40 on Billboard magazine's Hot 100 with "That'd Be Alright", "Work In Progress", "Drive (For Daddy Gene)", and the somber 9/11 ballad "Where Were You (When The World Stopped Turning)".  Later that year, Alan released his second holiday album, Let It Be Christmas, which made it to #27 on the Billboard 200 sales tally and #6 on the Country Albums chart. Three tracks from the set got enough airplay to appear on Billboard's Country Songs chart, with "Let It Be Christmas" peaking at #37. 

 

In the summer of 2003, Jackson put out his second Greatest Hits collection of Arista Records, which contained sixteen of his hits from 1996 to 2002, along with two new tracks, which would both be released as singles. The first sent Alan to the beach to pair up with a veteran country-rock artist, Jimmy Buffett. Buffett, who grew up in Mississippi but found his way to Nashville to start a music career, briefly working for Billboard in the process. At the start of the 1970s he was signed to Barnaby Records, where he released one unnoticed album Down To Earth and had another shelved. 

Moving to southern Florida, Buffett journeyman-ed around for a while before getting a deal from ABC/Dunhill Records. His second album with them in 1973 was A White Sport Coat and a Pink Crustacean, already forming her beachside bard persona already. The first single from the record was the story-song "The Great Filling Station Holdup", which popped on to Billboard's Country Singles chart at #58. That was followed by the Hawaiian guitar-infused  "Grapefruit - Juicy Fruit", which landed on Billboard Adult Contemporary (or "easy listening") chart. The album came in at #43 on the Country Albums chart.

At the start of the next year, Alan returned with his next set, Living and Dying in 3/4 Time, which was his first to make the Billboard 200 at #176. After the lead single "Saxophones" bubbled under the Hot 100 at #105, the next release from the set, "Come Monday", became his first big break, making the top-40 on the Hot 100 at #30, while spending a week at #3 on the Adult Contemporary radio chart and again appearing on the Country Singles list at #58. It also hit the top-40 in Australia (#19) and Canada (#23), expanding his audience.

With that momentum, Jimmy's next album, A1A, named for the famed Florida freeway, went top-40 on the Billboard 200 at #25, although he started to become more of a "fan-based" band, with none of the singles making a big impression on the charts ("Door Number Three" hit #88 on the Country Singles chart and bubbled under the Hot 100 at #102). His career got a second shot of the good stuff when Buffett released his seventh studio record in 1997, which sold over a million copies and crested at #12 on the Billboard 200 and #2 on the Country Albums chart. The biggest factor in that would be his "signature song", "Margaritaville", which climbed to #8 on the Hot 100, topped the Adult Contemporary chart for a week, and even rose to #13 on the Country Singles list. That was followed by another million-selling album, Son of a Son of a Sailor, which was his first to reach the top ten on the Billboard 200 at #10. The big hit from the record, the silly "Cheeseburger In Paradise", got to #32 on the Hot 100.  ABC/Dunhill was taken over by MCA Records by the end of the decade, when Jimmy released Volcano, which sold a half million and spun off the top-40 pop hit "Fins" (#35), which continues the beachside vibe but had a much more electric cosmopolitan country production.  

The 80's proved to move Buffett from the radio to being a "niche act", with his first three albums of the decade getting ignored by country stations, and only the semi-novelty "It's My Job" from 1981's Coconut Telegraph getting to the Hot 100 at #57, though it was one of his two hits on rock radio at #51, along with the weird attempt at new wave of 1983's "It's Midnight At I'm Not Famous Yet", which made the rock top-40 at #32. A remake of Van Morrison's "Brown Eyed Girl" in 1984 was a decent hit on Adult Contemporary radio at #13. 

Jimmy had the right idea (or advice) to hire on Jimmy Bowen to produce his 1984 record Riddles In The Sand. Bowen, who worked with George Strait, Reba McEntire, and Garth Brooks, was able to bring the country sound back to Buffett's music while keeping the steel drum island effects, and the third single from the record, "Who's The Blonde Stranger?", returned the singer/songwriter back to the country top-40 at #37. His biggest country radio hit from that period was "If The Phone Doesn't Ring, It's Me" which rose to #16 in 1985 as well at #37 on the Adult Contemporary list.  That same year, MCA released his greatest hits set Songs You Know By Heart, which is a timeless collection and sold over seven million copies, and last year after his passing went to #4 on the Billboard 200. 

However, as country radio was veering again to neo-traditional acts, Buffett found himself off that genre of radio in the late 1980s. Alan's concert presence, though, became cult-like, with throngs of "Parrotheads" flocking to his shows, and the 1990s saw his studio albums reach the top ten without much radio airplay at all besides a little on easy listening stations. However, as Kenny Chesney assumed the "country" distillation position of Buffett's beachtime branding, it was one of the neo-traditionalists, Alan Jackson, that brought Buffett back for a collaboration. "It's Five O'Clock Somewhere", written by Jim Brown and Don Rollins adopted the well-known home signage phrase that seemed tailor made for Buffett from the start. Produced by Jackson's go-to guy Keith Stegall, the production definitely is from Jackson's wheelhouse, albeit with a toned-down version of Buffett's work. In fact, Jimmy just comes in for the closing chorus, there to seemingly give legitimacy to the record, and in return getting his own boost by being on an Alan Jackson record. Sure, the lyrics are theme park slogan material, but they're at least seeming to have fun with it, and it was a needed break from the somber early 00's...

"It's Five O'Clock Somewhere" reached the top-20 on Billboard's Hot 100 in September of 2003, while parking itself at #1 on the Country Songs airplay chart for two months (eight weeks), becoming Jackson's longest-running chart-topping single. The Greatest Hits Volume II album, released in August of that year, spent a week at #1 on the Billboard 200 and eleven weeks atop the Country Albums list, going on to sell over seven million copies. At the Grammy Awards in 2004, "It's Five O'Clock Somewhere" won for Best Country Song. It was also up for Best Country Vocal Collaboration, losing to another pairing of soft-rocker with neotraditionalist with James Taylor and Alison Krauss' "How's The World Treating You". 

With the kickstart from his teaming with Jackson, Buffett released his own full-country album Licensed To Chill in 2004. The lead single, a silly remake of "Hey Good Lookin'" with Jackson, Chesney, Strait, Clint Black, and Toby Keith, made the country radio top ten at #8, while reaching #63 on the Hot 100. It was also nominated for the Country Collab Grammy the following year, which went to Loretta Lynn and Jack White's "Portland Oregon" (a much better choice). The second single from the set, the more reflective  "A Trip Around The Sun" with Martina McBride, climbed to #20. The album was his first and only #1 on the Billboard 200, while taking five weeks at the top of the Country Albums list, going on to sell a million copies. He had a second #1 country album in 2006 with Take The Weather With You, but radio wasn't biting, with "Bama Breeze" stalling at #58. 

Buffett would return to the top of the country chart and the top 20 on the Hot 100 with another featured role, this time with the Zac Brown Band on "Knee Deep" in 2011, which will be in this series eventually. His albums continued to sell, with 2020's Life On The Flip Side coming in at #2 on the Billboard 200. But sadly, skin cancer claimed Buffett in 2023 right before the release of his swan song album Equal Strain On All Parts, which got to #6 on the Billboard 200 and #2 on the Country Albums chart. A song from the record, "Bubbles Up", went to #17 on the Adult Contemporary radio chart.

Alan, and the Greatest Hits Volume II album, will be back to the series.

(6/10)

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Here's the concert version of the song which the footage was used for the video...

Next up, from one of Buffett's charity shows..

and lastly, Alan from a tornado relief benefit...

Up tomorrow: A hot producer comes to the front for the first time for this hit with Mr. Beyonce.