It’s been six very long years since Alan Jackson’s last studio record. Angels and Alcohol (2015) contained some of his best work, including “The One You’re Waiting On” and “When God Paints.” Now, with plenty of experience under his belt, Jackson eyes the follow up, a record called Where Have You Gone, which finds him wielding “his poet’s perspective to weave together a masterful love letter to country music,” UMG Nashville President Cindy Mabe says in a press statement.
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“This is Alan’s story, but it’s also the story of country music. This music love letter was written about the most universal experiences in life,” Mabe continues, “almost exclusively with Alan’s own pen, and it’s once again a reminder of what a one-of-a-kind creator he truly is.”
Where Have You Gone towers with 21 songs, including the bonus track “That’s the Way Love Goes,” as a tribute to Merle Haggard. Jackson’s songwriting fingerprints are present across 15 entries on the record. Alongside long-time producer Keith Stegall, the Country Music Hall of Fame legend swings for “a little harder country than even I’ve done in the past,” Jackson says. “And it’s funny, I was driving and listening to the final mixes Keith sent me, and I started to tear up. I was surprised to get so overly emotional, but I just love this kind of music.
“When I write, I visualize back home and growing up. Real country songs are life and love and heartache, drinking and Mama and having a good time,” he continues. “But it’s the sounds of the instruments, too. The steel and acoustic guitar, the fiddle—those things have a sound and a tone…and getting that right, the way those things make you feel, that’s country, too.”
The album announcement comes with the release of three new songs, the title track (a self-penned ballad lamenting the departure of “sweet country music”), “Way Down in My Whiskey,” and the timely “Things That Matter.“
Check out the track list below:
- “Where Have You Gone” (Alan Jackson)
- “Wishful Drinkin’” (Alan Jackson)
- “I Can Be That Something” (Alan Jackson)
- “Where the Cottonwood Grows” (Alan Jackson)
- “Way Down In My Whiskey” (Alan Jackson)
- “Things That Matter” (Robert Keith Stegall, Michael White)
- “Livin’ On Empty” (Alan Jackson)
- “You’ll Always Be My Baby (Written for Daughters’ Weddings)” (Alan Jackson)
- “Where Her Heart Has Always Been” (written for his mother’s funeral, containing audio of her reading from The Bible) (Alan Jackson)
- “The Boot” (Adam Wright)
- “Back” (Alan Jackson)
- “Write It In Red” (Alan Jackson)
- “So Late So Soon” (Scotty Emerick, Daniel Tashian, Sarah Buxton)
- “This Heart Of Mine” (Adam Wright)
- “A Man Who Never Cries” (Alan Jackson)
- “Chain” (Alan Jackson)
- “I Was Tequila” (Alan Jackson)
- “I Do (Written for Daughters’ Weddings)” (Alan Jackson)
- “Beer:10” (Alan Jackson)
- “The Older I Get”* (Hailey Whitters, Adam Wright, Sarah Turner)
Bonus Track: “That’s The Way Love Goes” (a tribute to Merle Haggard) (Lefty Frizzell, Whitey Shafer)
Photo by Russ Harrington
