On This Day in 1989, Garth Brooks Released His First No. 1 Single “If Tomorrow Never Comes”

On this day (August 21) in 1989, Garth Brooks released “If Tomorrow Never Comes” as a single from his debut album. It would go on to be the first of many No. 1 songs for the Oklahoma native. Additionally, it would become a staple of his live shows.

With a stack of hit singles, tens of millions of albums sold, and a trophy case packed with awards, Brooks is one of the biggest stars in country music history. Many artists have to wait to find their stride and start making hits. However, that wasn’t the case for him. His first single landed in the top 10 and was the beginning of a string of hits. Between 1989 and 1999, his songs missed the top 10 of the Billboard country chart only six times.

[RELATED: Watch Garth Brooks Perform His Signature Song, “Friends in Low Places” at His First CMA Awards Performance]

Garth Brooks Lands His First No. 1

Garth Brooks co-wrote “If Tomorrow Never Comes” with Kent Blazy. He released it as the second single from his self-titled debut album in 1989. It became his first No. 1 single. Decades later, Brooks still calls this his signature song.

While “If Tomorrow Never Comes” is a love song, it is not about the connection between the narrator and his lover. Instead, it’s a song about the love shared between a father and daughter. This explains lines like And if my time on earth were through / And she must face this world without me / Is the love I gave her in the past / Gonna be enough to last / If tomorrow never comes. If the lyrics were about his lover, wondering how she’d fare if she had to “face the world” without the narrator would be mildly infantilizing. On the other hand, those worries make much more sense when worrying about one’s child’s future.

Brooks wrote about the song in the liner notes for The Hits. “’If Tomorrow Never Comes’ will probably always be my signature song,” he wrote. “I ran the idea for this song by what seemed like a thousand writers and no one really seemed to understand what I was looking for. On the day that Bob Doyle, my co-manager, introduced me to Kent Blazy, I passed this idea by Kent and he had the first verse within fifteen seconds. I could tell he just felt it,” Brooks recalled.

Featured Image by Shutterstock