Clint Black Wanted to Yell Out His Car Window the First Time He Heard Himself on the Radio
Clint Black says that the first time he ever heard his debut single, "A Better Man," on country radio, it was especially momentous because of the circumstances. Not only was he in the middle of promotion for his then-forthcoming debut album, Killin' Time, but Black also happened to be in the car with his co-writer and bandmate, Hayden Nicholas, for the big moment. Read on to learn the full story, in Black's own words.
Hayden and I were in the car getting back from TNN [The Nashville Network, a country music-based cable network that launched in 1983 and closed in 2000]. I'd just done a taping with Shotgun Red [puppet co-host for talk show Nashville Now, voiced by puppeteer Steve Hall], God rest Steve's soul -- what a funny man.
We were driving, and we had just come from I-40 and were making our way over to Demonbreun [Street], heading back over to the Hampton Inn on West End. So we're on the freeway, and here it comes: "A Better Man," on the radio for the first time.
It was so perfect, especially because Hayden was there with me. The single was out, and we had been promoting it, but we hadn't heard it yet.
I saw a cartoon in a newspaper years ago, and it was a guy on the freeway stuck in traffic, and he was hanging out of the van, yelling at the top of his lungs, "That's my song on the radio!" That's kind of what we wanted to do; we wanted to yell out to all the other cars on the freeway that our song was on the radio.
It was quite a big deal ... It was all real now, and that's the way I felt when "A Better Man" played on the radio. It was all real. Everything that up to now was just an elusive thing that was said to be happening, was now actually happening. There's nothing like it.
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