Alan Jackson writes a lot of his own music. Ever since his freshman Here In The Real World album, out in 1989, Jackson has proven his ability to write songs. Not all of them are true to his own life. But some of them definitely are, including these three songs, which are among his most autobiographical.
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“Chasin’ That Neon Rainbow”
“Chasin’ That Neon Rainbow” is Jackson’s third Top 5 single. On Here In The Real World, Jackson wrote the song with Jim McBride.
“Chasin’ That Neon Rainbow” says, “Daddy won a radio, he tuned it to a country show / I was rocking in the cradle to the crying of a steel guitar / Mama used to sing to me, she taught me that sweet harmony / Now she worries ’cause she never thought I’d ever really take it this far / And chasing that neon rainbow, living that honky-tonk dream.”
In the album liner notes, Jackson said “Chasin’ That Neon Rainbow” is true to his own life.
“Jim McBride and I were writing together for the first time,” Jackson says (per Texas Hill Country). “We were talking about my life in Georgia and the experience of playing the honky tonk circuit. I remembered a radio that my daddy won when I was a young child and how my mama used to sing to my sisters and me. I also remembered how my mama hated for me to play in the bars. All those things set the story in motion, and within a few sessions, my life chasing that neon rainbow was set to music,”
“Remember When”
Jackson wrote “Remember When” by himself. The song, out in 2003, is on Jackson’s Greatest Hits Volume 11 album. “Remember When” is about his own marriage to his wife, Denise, with footage of them appearing in the video.
The painfully honest song looks back at their entire life together, including their brief separation. The song says, “Remember when / Old ones died and the new were born / And life was changed, disassembled, rearranged / We came together, fell apart / And broke each other’s hearts / Remember when.“
“Remember When” might be personal to Jackson, but it is a multi-platinum hit and one of the biggest-selling singles of his career.
“Drive (For Daddy Gene)”
In 2002, Alan Jackson included “Drive (For Daddy Gene)” on his Drive album. Written solely by Jackson, when it was released, he dedicated it to his father, Eugene Jackson, who passed away in 2000.
“Drive (For Daddy Gene)” says, “It was just an old plywood boat / With a ’75 Johnson and electric choke / A young boy, two hands on the wheel / I can’t replace the way it made me feel / And I would turn her sharp / And I would make it whine / He’d say, ‘You can’t beat the way an old wood boat rides’ / Just a little lake ‘cross the Alabama line / But I was king of the ocean / When Daddy let me drive.”
The song came from Jackson’s desire to write something in tribute to his father. Every other attempt became a “sad dying song,” which Jackson knew he didn’t want.
“I wanted to write something nice,” Jackson tells Billboard. “Daddy didn’t say much, [but one of] the things he really gave me is my love for cars, and this whole song is a bunch of facts, really.”
Photo by Jason Kempin/Getty Images
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