Photo by Shaun Silva // via @thetimmcgraw on Instagram
In the rugged, cutthroat land that is country music, there’s a neverending race for king, and these days it mostly comes down to the two competing factions of Tim McGraw and Kenny Chesney. Tim McGraw is the Jay Z of country, the unfuckwithable king with old school attitude and commercial credibility. Kenny Chesney is more of a Ludacris, a party-oriented country great who decided to retire to the beach and be in a perpetual state of having a good time while still scoring chart successes.
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Tim has been around a little longer, and he takes on a kind of brooding older brother or dad role in his music. He gives you advice on how to live, he acts like an adult, and he’s there to give you a stern look when you’ve done something wrong. Kenny is more of the drunken uncle. He’s the guy Tim will laugh with, have a beer with, and wonder, on the way home when he thinks the kids are asleep in the backseat, why can’t Kenny just get a real job and stop all this partyin’.
Both artists have released some blockbuster, amazing singles over the years: Tim with “Indian Outlaw” and “Don’t Take the Girl” and Kenny with “Me and You” and “She Thinks My Tractor’s Sexy.” All these tracks were very much rooted in the old country sound, and both artists seemed to be rolling on to the same country sunset. Then, the boys split ways musically all thanks to, essentially, one track. In 1998, Tim McGraw received a song called “How Forever Feels.” He recorded it, but, after some back and forth, decided not to release it. Kenny Chesney also recorded a version of it, and when Tim passed on releasing it, Kenny released it for himself. That song became a number one country hit, and launched Kenny into his Beach Life phase. After it hit number one, according to an interview Kenny did with Billboard in 1999, Tim told Kenny, “I’m glad you cut it. It just didn’t work for me.”
Tim has never really jumped on the beach bum train like most other country artists did in the late 90s and early 00s. Kenny jumped in boots first and never looked back, and it has split the whole of country music into these two camps: to beach or not to beach. Now, 16 years after that fateful song, the two are releasing new albums a week apart: Kenny’s is The Big Revival and Tim’s is Sundown Heaven Town. Each album takes on several of the same genre tropes: the love song, the country nostalgia song, the mainstream pop crossover attempt, and the classic heartbreak song. There’s only one way to find out if beach blanket bingo bro or brooding love stud runs country: this showdown!
THE LOVE SONG: “Wild Child” vs. “Shotgun Rider”
You can’t beat a country love song when it comes to pure emotion and realness, and Tim and Kenny are both country love song pros. Still, Tim has dominated this category over the years with tracks like “Don’t Take the Girl,” “Just to See You Smile,” and “It’s Your Love,” so it’d take a lot from Kenny to really compete.
For his entry, Kenny brings “Wild Child,” which sees him paired with the satin-smooth throwback country voice of Grace Potter. Kenny sings about his free-spirit rock lover who leaves his “heart and her hair a mess” and who has “a spirit that can’t be tamed” and a “rebel soul with a whole lot of gypsy.” The pair’s voices meld supremely well in the choruses, and the light rolling drums and guitar hold their voices like a feather in the breeze. The smallest misstep is the second verse lines of “Never heard of her favorite band/unless you been to Bonnaroo or Burning Man,” but the next line of “She’s Penny Lane in a Chevy van/she loves to love and she loves me wild, child,” saves it.
Tim busts out “Shotgun Rider,” which has an intro that’s eerily similar to Arcade Fire’s “No Cars Go” but also relies on his trademark smooth baritone. He sings to his girl about never wanting anyone else as his co-pilot “wherever sweet time takes” them. He doesn’t want to hear another voice “calling [him] baby on the other end of the phone line,” and no other “shotgun rider” beside him “singin’ to the radio.” The cascading guitars on “Shotgun Rider” fall in line with Tim’s traditionally revved-up instrumentals, but he makes the misstep of repeating the chorus one too many times.
Advantage: Kenny on this one. Both songs are rock solid, but Kenny edges out Tim with a light touch and great lyrics. The McGraw clan takes a hit right to their tried and true battlements, as a Corona bottle explodes against their drawbridge. Tim loads the catapults with his heavy artillery…
THE COUNTRY NOSTALGIA SONG: “Beer Can Chicken” vs. “Meanwhile Back at Mama’s
Country music loves nostalgia almost as much as love or love lost. Every artist has to touch on the theme at least once an album in some way—how great things were back home as kids, what it was like being a high schooler in the fields, and how great it was drinkin’ beers on the tailgate. How you’ve gotta escape the modern world for these relaxing country moments in order to recharge. That shit is important. Vital even. Beer tastes better without smog and honking cars and instead with a side of campfire smoke and lightning bugs. It’s science.
“Beer Can Chicken” is Kenny’s offering for a trip down memory lane. He takes us dockside at a Tennessee lake house, riding down an old country highway with his friends crammed in a truck, with “somethin’ in a jug just made for sippin’,” just waiting for beer can chicken to cook. Even though it’s a reminder that modern life is too busy and that everything “good in life you’ve gotta wait for,” the track’s wailing guitars and “whoa-oh” choruses are tailor-made for arenas, and the country rock loses the light touch of “Wild Child.”
Tim brings the heat with “Meanwhile Back at Mama’s,” a gorgeous track that’s just as relaxing as the country scene it paints. He teams up with his wife, Faith Hill, to bring back the couple’s old blockbuster magic of days past, and their voices flow and roll together. Tim sings about getting overwhelmed with the city life of fast cars and noise, and how he longs to be back where he comes from “where only horses run.” He sings about mama’s, where “supper’s on the stove and beer’s in the fridge,” where the “game’s on the tube, daddy smokes cigarettes/whiskey keeps his whistle wet.” You can almost hear the tall grass and corn rustle in the breeze.
Advantage: Tim 100 percent takes this one. “Meanwhile Back at Mama’s” is without question one of the best songs he has released in years. Kenny does party country well, but when it comes to escaping the city life for the country life, I need strong handshake and light pat on the shoulder—not a holler and a slap on the back. Chesney camp gets blasted, while McGraw laughs from on high.
MAINSTREAM CROSSOVER SONG: “American Kids” vs. “Lookin’ For That Girl”
Country, like other genres, has a long history of jumping on the broader trends of the moment. In recent years, Taylor Swift has successfully melded country and pop starlet, and Florida Georgia Line has hit it big by incorporating hip-hop sounds and themes into their songs. In the mid-to-late 90s country stars were covering R&B ballads, and, of course, there was Tim McGraw teaming up with Nelly on the weird country rap travesty “Over and Over.”
Kenny has pulled inspiration from the pop bluegrass/folk explosion—which actually makes sense for country—and comes with “American Kids,” which could basically be a Lumineers or Mumford and Sons song. There’s bouncing acoustic guitar, an intro with a group shout of “hey,” and a group sing-a-long chorus. You can hear a banjo underneath it all, which makes sense—banjos are country—but did he need to add in the group chants so brazenly?
Tim goes full throttle WTF on his genre-spanning track, “Lookin’ For That Girl.” Tim is no stranger to pop tropes, but with “Lookin’ For That Girl” it feels like he’s trying way too hard to get that crossover hit. His voice is drenched in Auto-Tune, and the music behind him sounds like a GarageBand version of pop drums and keyboards that someone recorded a steel guitar over, with everything but the drums buried way in the back of the mix. Also, hearing Tim sing the words “Funky Cold Medina” within the first two lines gave me PTSD flashbacks to bad small town karaoke. It’s basically Tim four tequilas deep singing Bruno Mars.
Advantage: Kenny picked a good style to blend with country. Tim can go as pop as he wants, but this is just misguided Auto-Tune abuse. What would that old Indian Outlaw think of that? Chesney launches a barrage of limes, and McGraw can only cower behind the gate.
HEARTBREAK SONG: “Save it for a Rainy Day” vs. “Sick of Me”
This is the sweetest of sweet spots for country music. Every person across the United States has made the “Oh, country music? Lost my dog and my truck and my girl all at once?” joke at least once in their lives. That’s fine. Those songs are part of what makes country what it is. Old, sad, drunken country songs are pure tear-jerking gold that rock ballads can’t touch with a ten-foot cattle prod.
Kenny brings “Save it for a Rainy Day” to the contest, and it’s about as close to old Chesney as the entire album gets. However, he tosses in a nice twist on the heartbreak by telling his broken heart to get the fuck over it. He sings in the chorus: “The sun’s too bright, the sky’s too blue, beer’s too cold to be thinkin’ ‘bout you/gonna take this heartbreak and tuck it away/and save it for a rainy day.” It’s a simple song in the best way, and Kenny nails it.
Tim’s wheelhouse is serious sadness. The guy can take heartbreak and roll around in it in the greatest way. “Sick of Me” takes the full brunt of the heartache and wears it like scarlet “A.” He sings, “I’m sinkin’ down on some corduroy couch, empty bottles all around, and I’m still tryin’ to start my day,” like a proper heartbroken drunk. He caps it off with a chorus of “I miss you, and I’m sick of me too.” Geez Tim, lay off yourself a little—but at the same time don’t because goddamn it you’re nailing it.
Advantage: It’s really too close to call. Kenny added a nice upbeat twist on the heartbreak trope, but the way Tim wallows and wails is so damn good as well. Chesney and McGraw have met on the battlefield and have locked swords face-to-face.
THE VERDICT:
These guys are country music superstar elite status. Tim adds “Diamonds and Barstools” and “City Lights” to “Shotgun Rider,” “Sick of Me,” and “Meanwhile Back at Mama’s” as some of his best work, but Sundown Heaven Town lags in the second half. Kenny, I’m surprised to say, has created a well-rounded album front to back despite occasionally oppressive amounts of the electric guitar that pops up on every single track. Kenny takes it this round, but Tim has Grammys—and the reassurance that the two will meet again in America’s most hallowed arena, the country music jukebox.
Nick Freed is Noisey’s country music sabermetrician. He’s on Twitter – @GaryDinkledge
