This Kenny Rogers Hit Was Intended for Van Stephenson Instead

In 1987, Kenny Rogers had a crossover hit with “Twenty Years Ago”. On his They Don’t Make Them Like They Used To album, “Twenty Years Ago” was written by Dan Tyler, Wood Newton, C. Michael Spriggs, and Michael Noble.

“Twenty Years Ago” became a Top 5 country single for Rogers. The nostalgic song says, “And there’s the old movie house / They finally closed it down / You could find me there every Friday night / Twenty years ago.” Although “Twenty Years Ago” seems tailor-made for Rogers, the song wasn’t actually written with him in mind. Several other artists unsuccessfully tried to release “Twenty Years Ago” before it got to Rogers, including Van Stephenson. Perhaps ironically, it’s Van Stephenson’s track that was used by Rogers.

“It took about six years for someone to record it,” Newton tells The Boot. “The great songwriter Fred Knobloch had a [record] deal, and I think he recorded it first. Then Juice Newton cut it. And Kenny Mims, who was a great guitar player and producer, was working with Van Stephenson before there was a group called BlackHawk, and they recorded it in a 16-track studio in an attic on 16th Avenue.”

How Kenny Rogers Recorded “Twenty Years Ago” With Van Stephenson’s Track

Stephenson went on to form Blackhawk, a country group, with Henry Paul and Dave Robbins. But he at first was a solo artist who planned on cutting “Twenty Years Ago”.

“Kenny Rogers was looking for songs, and he heard it and decided to cut it before Van could get a record deal,” Newton recounts. “In fact, the music tracks to his version of the song are the ones that were recorded for Van Stephenson. Kenny tried to record it and beat the tracks Van did, but he couldn’t, so they were wise enough to say, ‘Let’s just buy the tracks that have already been done.’ They did a few overdubs, but basically they used the tracks that had already been cut.”

Newton wrote a lot of hit singles, but “Twenty Years Ago” will always be one of his most autobiographical.

“At the time we wrote ‘Twenty Years Ago’, it had been about 20 years since I had graduated from high school,” Newton says. “The song was just the idea of going back to your hometown 20 years later and reminiscing, and all the memories and things that come up.”

Part of “Twenty Years Ago” says, “How could we know he’d never come back 20 years ago?” It’s a line that Newton says may be the reason why the song didn’t get recorded right away.

“I think that line might have made some people hesitate about the song,” he explains. “Because at that time, the country was trying to forget the war and get over it.”

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