CMT Blog: Rodney Atkins

There are so many country songs about small towns. But somehow, not one of them ever mentions Meth Watch.

Now, I know I’m gullible. And I like to believe that all those pictures of small towns that country music paints are real. But after spending eight hours in the car yesterday, traveling through the Midwest’s rural farm towns, I was struck with the loss of innocence.

Where I expected to see Justin Moore’s old dirt roads, I saw signs telling me, “This Town Is on Meth Watch.” When I was looking for Rodney Atkins‘ lemonade stands, I saw only adult bookstores. When I wanted to see kids painting their names on dirt road bridges, I just saw billboards for fireworks outlets. And while I was trying to find Billy Currington’s little country store with an old Coke sign, I saw boarded-up shops. There were no flat-bed trucks with guys selling turnips, either.

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The early bird gets the worm and — at least Friday morning (May 29) on Fox & Friends — Rodney Atkins, too. And even better, a live performance of Atkins’ brand new single, “15 Minutes.” The one where he admits that he gave up smokin’, women and drinkin’, and it was the worst 15 minutes of his life. It is a solid country summertime hit if I’ve ever heard one. One where he sounds a little bit like Dierks Bentley (when he laughs) and a little bit like Tim McGraw (when he drawls). Not a bad combination at all. So I’m looking forward to hearing Atkins do it live in the New York studio. He’ll be on Fox sometime between 6 and 9 a.m. ET, right when I’m getting my kids off to school (which is pretty much the worst 15 minutes of my life), so I will have to DVR this one to make sure I don’t miss it.

Picture any clique from your high school. Bitchy Cheerleaders. Holier-Than-Thou Jocks. Squinty-Eyed Stoners. Now try to picture Nashville’s singers and songwriters being that divisive. I’ve tried to imagine it, but just can’t. Even though a feature story in The Washington Post ponders the very real possibility that it may be exactly what’s happening on Music Row.

What the article really is is a big-picture look at small-town songs. About how those songs have spread throughout the country landscape like fire on a stream of kerosene down a dirt road, with Justin Moore’s “Small Town USA,” Rodney Atkins‘ “These Are My People,” Jason Aldean’s “Hicktown” and Zac Brown Band’s “Chicken Fried” right there in the thick of it.

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It makes sense that two country stars would have the same taste in tour buses. But I never realized you could actually pass down a bus from one artist to another. In this video interview with Rodney Atkins, though, he talks about how he was in love with Martina McBride’s tour bus when he was first on the road as her opening act. So when her lease ran out, the bus company offered it to Team Atkins. They’ve made some changes to the big red bus since signing the papers. It’s now adorned with 12-gauge shotgun shells around the window frames, pictures of Atkins’ family and the third place ribbon he and his son won in the Cub Scouts Pinewood Derby. There’s no ribbon hanging on the bus wall for his No. 1 song, “It’s America,” but I’m guessing he’ll find some other way to commemorate that.

Ever wonder how true that Rodney Atkins song “Cleaning This Gun (Come On In Boy)” really is? For Carrie Underwood, it was way, way, way too true. In an audio clip of her describing her first date ever (which ultimately became her worst date ever), it totally fits. She was 16 and going out with an older guy. “And he came in and my dad actually had gotten out his shotguns to start cleaning them,” she says. Then they went out, and he really didn’t put that much thought into their destination. They tried going to a movie, but Underwood couldn’t get in to any R-rated movies, so they watched a horrible movie, left halfway through and he took her home. Bet he’s kicking himself now.

It seems like I left Detroit way too early. I moved out of my childhood home in the Motor City in 1983, the very same year a country radio station there started this Downtown Hoedown. A free country music festival. Free. And it’s country. For three days. And it’s not just a handful of bands you’ve never heard of. This year’s event, on May 15-17, boasts Willie Nelson, Lee Ann Womack, Phil Vassar, Jack Ingram, Luke Bryan, Rodney Atkins, Zac Brown Band, Darryl Worley, Eli Young Band and even more on the books. Maybe I should go back, just for the weekend, and drag all my old friends into the city to hear some good country. The people in charge expect about 800,000 country fans to soak in all that rowdy twangy music in downtown’s Hart Plaza. I wonder if John Rich will be one of them, now that they’re shuttin’ Detroit down for a very good reason.

Well, well, well. One man at Newsweek doesn’t like a Rodney Atkins song, and now we’re all supposed to think country ain’t what it used to be? Thanks for your opinion, Steve Tuttle, but you are in the minority. So I’ll take your rant — and I’ll raise you one.

You say you turn bright red with shame every time Atkins’ “Watching You” comes on. You say Garth Brooks was the final nail in the honky-tonk coffin. And you jump to the conclusion that country music has somehow lost its outlaw charm. Well, guess what? That could very well be a good thing. With the precarious state our nation’s in, why in the world would country fans want songs about senseless killings, prison life and heavy drinking? And why must you (and a handful of others like you) assume that music loved by moms driving to Target in their minivans is bad. Do you have something against Target? Minivans? Or Moms?

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In what was probably supposed to be just an interview about his new album, It’s America, Rodney Atkins changes the subject a bit and opens up a lot more than usual about his adoption back story. When he took on the role as spokesman for the National Council for Adoption, it got Atkins thinking about meeting his birth mother. Not just because of his involvement with the NCA but because, as he explains it, “People kept hitting me with the ‘I’m-your-kin’ thing. I wanted to put that to rest.” Eventually, the story circles back to the music, talking about one track (”The River Just Knows”) as one of “healing, coming home and forgiveness.” A little more depth from Atkins, whose style is what the Washington Post calls a catchy combination of wide-reaching observations and good ol’ Southern swagger. There’s even a quote from Mike Curb, the head of Atkins’ label: “Most artists give up before we do. But Rodney, as you know, was adopted and given back a couple of times. There was a lot of strength of character that came out of that. We just kept trying different things, and we finally got it right.”

Three bona fide country videos, along with an Americana-country hybrid, showed up and threw themselves on the mercy of the CMT New Video Evaluation Team this week. There are pickup trucks in three of these four videos, and there would have been one in the fourth, if it didn’t consist entirely of stage performance footage.

Artist: Billy Ray Cyrus
Video: “Back to Tennessee”
Director: Declan Whitebloom

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In Rodney Atkins‘ new video for “It’s America,” he’s inspired to describe all the things that, to him, make America what it is. It all starts when he sees some kids selling lemonade in front of a mechanic’s shop, and the list takes off from there. Interestingly, a lot of the things Atkins cites as American either happened decades ago or could describe a number of countries, so I decided to write a short verse of my own, and see if anyone can figure out what country I’m talking about. Here it goes: “It’s a maple leaf on a flag/It’s a rippling lake with fish/It’s a Mountie with funny paaaaaaaaaants/It’s _________!” Maybe you can come up with some, too.