Darius Rucker “Learn to Live”
For all the talk about Grunge and Alt and Gen X, the 90s was mostly a Hip Hop decade -- musically and culturally. Grunge was a briefly popular, technically minor genre. Nirvana, who were never really a Grunge band but who became the patron saints of Alt, basically had a three year run before Kurt died. And by 1996, the oddity of Alternative Rock was subsumed by the sameness of Adult Alternative Rock. In retrospect, and because of societal biases, we replace what was “popular” or “pervasive” with what was “beloved” or “defining” (to white people). I’m white. I can be guilty of the same nostalgic sleight of hand. When I close my eyes and reimagine the decade, I sometimes see Lollapalooza. I see Jane’s Addiction and Beck and the Beastie Boys and Sonic Youth and, of course, Nirvana and Pearl Jam. But when I open my eyes and actually look at facts, I see something else. I see Biggie and Tupac and Puff Daddy. And right behind them I see Garth and Shania and (yes) Billy Ray. And right behind them I see Alanis and Matchbox 20. And, behind all of that, but also precisely in the middle of everything, I see Hootie and the Blowfish.
Hootie was initially music for (white) fraternity members until, one day, they were music for ninety percent of America. They were young enough to be considered College Rock and, through association, slightly Alternative. Their guitars were just loud enough to qualify as Mainstream Rock. And their jangle was easy enough to inch towards Roots Rock. Being from South Carolina, they were Country adjacent. And given that their lead singer was Black and had a rich baritone, they were frequently described as “Soulful.” Their success was a product of their geniality (they always seemed to be smiling), their eclecticism (they could be played on a dozen different radio formats), and their immediacy (after two listens, you could not not sing along). However, because they had a dash of so many ingredients, they were also often accused of being completely tasteless.
“Cracked Rear View,” Hootie’s gargantuan breakthrough album, deflated the angst of Generation X. Much more so than “Nevermind” or “Ten,” “Cracked Rear View” is the soundtrack to the Clinton years. It’s music for a peacetime country that loved “Friends,” The Gap and, eventually, Matchbox 20. Released near the peak of compact disc consumption, the album was one of the ten biggest sellers of the 1990s and one of the one hundred top selling albums of all time. Not only were Hootie “a thing,” but, for about a year, they were everything.
As quick as their ascent seemed (in fact, they’d been sweating it out on the college circuit for years), Hootie’s descent was twice as swift. While radio programmers and record store buyers wanted more, more, more, writers and critics sneered. The band was accused of historic blandness. They were considered the very opposite of Alternative. Even next to their more jammy friends like the Spin Doctors and Blues Traveler (not to mention Phish), Hootie sounded more conservative and less interesting. Those twenty somethings who adored “Reality Bites” and “Singles” and who had graduated onto Pavement and Built to Spill were out for blood, and Hootie was vulnerable prey.
For what it’s worth, I think that there was some cause for the cynicism. But the “briefly popular and eternally boring” narrative that defined the Hootie backlash also obscured deeper, more complicated matters. For one, there is the fact that the band’s music (and especially the guitars) was born from 80s College Rock. If you remove the vocals and just plug into the jangle, they don’t sound so far off from early R.E.M. or The dBs or Jellyfish or, even, The Feelies. Additionally, while never known for their virtuosity or adventurousness, they were considered an extremely “tight” and “live” band. Their singles were sturdy and uncomplicated — there was an ease about their music that had a palliative effect. And, of course, their most famous choruses were undeniable, which was, no doubt, part of their undoing.
Many artists have suffered vicious backlashes. The Bee Gees went into hiding at the end of the 70s. Alanis was held up and then picked apart. The Dixie Chicks couldn’t show their faces in church. Even The Beatles had their records trashed. But Hootie’s toppling began seemingly from the very moment that they arrived. Some part of this was on account of the elitism of music journalism. Some of it was a natural regression -- things that go up do come back down. Some of it was racism. But I suspect that some of it was also physiological -- our ears simply tired of the sound of the band.
Darius Rucker has a strong, middle baritone. It’s a striking instrument. There are very few comparable singers throughout the history of Rock music. Levi Stubbs had a similar quality, but he sang Soul music. Jim Morrison had similar range, but he was as much a narrator or a poet as a singer. Johnny Cash sang Country. Frank Sinatra sang Jazz and Pop. Rucker’s voice shares some qualities with all of those singers, but applied to two and three chord Rock music, the effect was flatter and duller. Also, while he has obvious range, Hootie’s songs never asked for subtlety. And so, that voice, played over and over and over, began to accumulate weight. When you first heard the band, it was kind mildly refreshing. The thousandth time you heard them (in a relatively short span), the more it felt like blunt force trauma.
Either to exploit or exacerbate (depending on who you asked) the Hootie phenomenon, a series of slightly alternative, frequently acoustic Rock bands began to flood the market. There were the Gin Blossoms and The Verve Pipe and the Goo Goo Dolls and, most famously, Matchbox 20, whose songs shared a similar jangle and whose singer shared a similar range. When Rob Thomas’ band exploded in 1996, it was just as Darius Rucker’s band was recoiling. For the next few years, though, Matchbox 20 was as ubiquitous as Hootie had been. To the average ear, it amounted to a half decade of Hootie-esque music dominating the airwaves, assaulting our ears. It was the same few chords, interrupted only briefly by Carlos Santana. And it was the same (enough) baritone. The cumulative effect was simply too repetitive. Too middling. It was the sound of every radio station for half a decade. And we couldn’t make it stop.
Though every member of Hootie suffered on account of the backlash, it was, of course, Darius Rucker who was the most frequent target. For a large swath of America, Rucker was “Hootie.” Many listeners never bothered to figure out the singer’s name. Others derisively tagged him with that nickname. If it bothered Rucker, he almost never showed it. His geniality was perhaps admirable, but it was also weaponized against him. Because he was a Black singer in an otherwise white band, playing music for overwhelmingly white audiences, during a moment of Hip Hop’s cultural crossover, Rucker occupied a complicated space. And though he was not at all politically indifferent, he worked hard to ensure that his perspectives did not define his band. Like his music, there was a workmanlike quality to Rucker’s persona -- he liked to show up and do his work, with charm and humility. When it came to matters of race, he presented more like Henry Aaron or Willie Mays than Bill Russell or Kareem Abdul Jabbar. He was thoughtful but not exactly outspoken. He was also, of course, an unwitting and unfair foil for the glitz of Hip Hop’s biggest stars. Rucker was a “college guy.” He played golf. He was buddies with Woody Harrelson. Though probably only partially, explicitly racist, the painting of Rucker as “normal Black guy” was a trope that publicly defined him for many years. I suspect that it was a lonely and problematic role that he was cast into. And it would follow him during his unlikely and extraordinary post-Hootie career.
As his band’s prospects continued to fade, Rucker made his first pass as a solo artist. In 2001 he recorded “The Return of Mongo Slade,” a Neo Soul album that was shelved by Atlantic Records and then released a year later as “Back to Then” by an indie label. He brought in Jill Scott, Snoop Dogg, Lil’ Mo and a couple dozen R&B heavyweights. But, in a genre defined by slippery beats, falsettos and style, Rucker’s even keel and heavy baritone landed flat. The record charted only very briefly and was quickly forgotten. Rucker himself acknowledged that while he loved contemporary R&B, that his own dalliance was probably just that -- a passing fancy.
After “Back to Then,” and with dubious prospects, Rucker retreated. His band was not especially welcomed in Rock circles. It had not been long enough for distance or nostalgia to reshape opinions. And he never got a legitimate sniff from R&B fans. It would be another six years before we heard new music from him. When Darius Rucker did finally reemerge, it would be in a form that very few could have predicted and many doubted, but which, in retrospect, made perfect sense.
Though he was prepared to work his way up from the bottom rung, Rucker was a star in Nashville almost from the start. His transition from milquetoast Rock to full-throated Country singer raised some eyebrows. There were those who were confused. There were some who suggested that the move was a gimmick. Even for those who assumed the best of intentions, there was still the blinding whiteness of the genre. Before Rucker’s invitation in 2012, there were exactly two Black members of the Grand Ole Opry. Of those two, only one was a singer and that was, of course, Charlie Pride. It took decades for Pride to join the Opry and it was another twenty years before Rucker followed. Before and in between, the number of Black superstars in Nashville could be counted on zero hands.
Racism within Country Music’s “establishment” and the perceived tokenism of Rucker made for appropriately impassioned conversation among people who are much more educated on the subject than I am. The fact that he occupied a similar role in 1990s Rock only served to sharpen the point. Andrea Williams has been especially thoughtful and articulate on the subject of race in Country Music for NPR and for Vulture. That being said, the person who has been most credible is, unsurprisingly, Rucker himself. It’s convenient to imagine the singer as a symptom or an exception or a sign of something so deep and so wide as to make it unapproachable. But it’s another thing altogether to hear Darius Rucker talk about his love of the genre, his admiration for the city, his relationship with The South and his role as the most famous living, Black Country musician. In time, the singer began to speak out more frequently and candidly.
Beyond the messy cultural context and the heady semiotics of “Darius Rucker, Country Star,” is the simple fact that his voice was almost perfectly designed for the form. Country Music loves a good baritone. And Rucker has a great one. He doesn’t sound dark like Johnny or weathered like Merle or whiskey-soaked like Waylon. But, vocally he’s in their zip code. He’s probably closer to his friend and sometime collaborator, Brad Paisley, who also likes to mix some Rock with his Country. From the opening lines of “Don’t Think I Don’t Think About It,” Rucker’s very first Country music single, it was evident that his voice wasn’t made for Rock radio or Adult Alternative or stadiums or fraternity houses. It was made for Nashville.
In spite of the immediate and obvious fit and in spite of his former superstardom, Rucker was determined to climb the Country ladder cautiously. In interviews he was typically humble. He said the right things and dropped the right names. He visited all the radio stations. He invited Brad Paisley and Vince Gill and Alison Krauss to sing on his record. Then he invited thirty more members of Nashville royalty to join on steel guitar, banjo, dobro, mandolin, fiddle, baritone guitar, violin, Wurlitzer, Hammond, bass and drums. Though he grew up in the South and though he had previously written several massive hits that sounded more than a little like Country songs, Rucker knew he was still an outsider. And not just any outsider. He was a non-white outsider who was also once a Rock star who was knocking on the door of an (almost) all-white industry that loves tradition. Some mix of wariness and humility seemed necessary, if not totally appropriate.
Whatever it was -- the star studded line up, the name recognition, the smiles, the handshakes or simply the voice -- “Learn to Live” was an instant success. It produced three number one singles at Country radio and a fourth single that landed at number three. It sold over a million copies at a time when that really meant something. And it was the sort of story that -- no matter what you felt about Hootie and the Blowfish -- made you feel like something good and right was happening.
Even better -- the success was fully earned. “Learn to Live” is a very good, modern Country record. The playing is tight and alive throughout. Guitars of all sorts come in from all angles. Fiddles and violins gild the arrangements and fill in the gaps. And the hooks are strapping and familiar -- landing somewhere in between classic Country and the rootsiness of Rucker’s former band. As if to qualify himself in a city full of songwriters, he co-wrote eleven of the twelve songs on the album, including all four of the singles. And, as if to ensure a warm welcome, he opens with a Hootenanny on "Forever Road" and then some line dancing on “All I Want.” Though neither song was sent to radio, they are, in fact, two of the album’s best.
Rucker finishes his credentialing with the album’s one, enduring, smash hit. “Don’t Think I Don’t Think About It” pairs a country-perfect title and sentiment with a voice and jangle that recalls Matchbox 20. The song raced to number one on the Country charts and also returned Rucker to the top forty of the Billboard Hot 100. Of the album’s (four) singles, “History in the Making” is the other standout. Though not the equal of the opening salvos, it’s fast and fun and fully cheesy and completely reminiscent of 90s Adult Alternative Rock -- just with more steel guitar.
Elsewhere, “It Won’t be Like This for Long” is a charming tearjerker in the vein of “Cats in the Cradle,” but with a daughter swapped for the son. And on “If I had Wings,” Vince Gill and Alison Kraus join Rucker for a soppier number designed for Sunday church. Lots of strings. Lots of pensive “what ifs.” It’s somehow both vaguely Christian and kind of like Camus for a cheap greeting card. It’s a pretty song, highlighted by the harmonies. But it’s also probably a waste of three overqualified vocalists. “While I Still Got the Time” is similarly trite, but less gaudy. Whereas on most of the album Rucker holds back, nursing the vocals to affect Country sentiment, here he goes full Hootie in the chorus. When he belts out “I am going to dance like nobody is watching,” he toes the line between unforgivably trite and wonderfully earnest. It’s the line he’d been avoiding for most of “Learn to Live,” but the one that he’d been navigating his whole career.
Compared to a Country Rock record by Chris Stapleton or Sturgill Simpson, “Learn to Live” feels slightly tepid. There are lead guitars, but no solos. No distortion or feedback. Everything is tidy. But contrasted with the garishness of Contemporary Country, it feels ragged and lived in. Compared to either, Rucker’s debut is undeniably well made and, presumably, well paid for. And, in spite of any cynical suggestions otherwise, his Country turn never sounds forced or disingenuous. It is more a case of him reconstituting many of key ingredients from his former band, but with more whiskey and butter. I will admit that in the 90s I spat out Hootie after a month or two — it was kind of tasteless. But “Learn to Live” has flavor — it’s more Cheddars than Cracker Barrel.
When it was first announced, and before anyone heard it, Rucker’s debut inspired its share of cynical “huhs?” Over a decade removed, however, the pivot sounds natural to the point of being inevitable. Darius Rucker is simply a great singer of Country music. He evidently always has been. But sandwiched in between Jewel, The Wallflowers and Fastball, it was harder to hear.
Following “Learn to Live,” Rucker settled in as one of Country’s most reliable superstars. He’s since released three number one Country albums and a fourth that debuted near the top. In 2013, you could not avoid his cover of “Wagon Wheel.” Rather than deriding the ubiquity, though, we all cheered on the comeback story. For more than half the country, he is no longer “Hootie,” but rather, “Darius Rucker, Country music star.” And while he is not exactly the “Jackie Robinson of Nashville” (that would be either Ray Charles or Charlie Pride, depending on who you ask) he may be the “Larry Doby of Nashville” -- the second barrier breaker who opened the gates more widely. Mickey Guyton, Kane Brown, Brittney Spencer and many other Black artists make music in the wake that Rucker helped create.
Nearly three decades after we first saw him on Letterman (and then heard him twice every hour on VH-1) Darius Rucker seems both completely comfortable and kind of unfathomable. He was once, briefly, the lead singer for a hugely popular Rock band. But when fortunes turned, they turned hard. And so, for nearly a decade, he and his band were a 90s cliche -- the butt of jokes. The probability of that backlash, however, was only surpassed by the improbability of Rucker’s reemergence in Nashville. His reign as the most successful Black musician in Country music -- an extreme outlier in the whitest music market -- now appears unassailable. So while I cannot fathom the degree to which racism still affects his daily life, there’s nothing flukey or tenuous about his newfound success. Taken together -- the backlash and the genre hop -- his career resembles that of the Bee Gees and Ray Charles. He’s not the writer that Barry Gibb was and he’s not a sliver of Ray. But, also, he’s not Shania Twain or Mark McGrath or Rob Thomas. And he’s not Hootie. He’s Darius Rucker.