The Best Country Songs Of All Time Ranked
The term country music gained popularity in the 1940s in preference to hillbilly music; it came to encompass Western music, which evolved parallel to hillbilly music from similar roots, in the mid-20th century. Contemporary styles of Western music include Texas country, red dirt, and Hispano- and Mexican American-led Tejano and New Mexico music, all extant alongside longstanding indigenous traditions. The main components of the modern country music style date back to music traditions throughout the Southern United States and Southwestern United States, while its place in American popular music was established in the 1920s during the early days of music recording. According to country historian Bill C. Malone, country music was “introduced to the world as a Southern phenomenon.” Here are the best Country songs of all time.
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15. Before He Cheats – Carrie Underwood
“This crossover smash emerged from circumstances as prefabricated as country music gets – written and produced by men whose credits include Lady Antebellum and Rascal Flatts, sung by an American Idol winner and sporting a literal-interpretation video. And yet the popcraft of “Before He Cheats,” as rendered by Carrie Underwood in the key of frosty rage, is nearly perfect.”
14. Fancy – Reba McEntire
“Reba’s cover of the 1969 Bobbie Gentry classic and the accompanying music video elaborated on the rags-to-riches story of Fancy Rae Baker. It became the redheaded singer’s signature encore song, complete with a red dress revealed from beneath a black coat in the song’s second half.”
13. Friends In Low Places – Garth Brooks
“With a voice stirring together the low end of Johnny and the high whine of Hank, Garth Brooks was just beginning his historic superstar run. A couple dozen folks – including “Low Places” songwriters Dewayne Blackwell and Earl “Bud” Lee – partied in the studio to create the bar-storming romp heard on the final refrain. But the party was just starting. The hit helped Brooks’ second album, No Fences, ship 17 million copies in the U.S. – still one of the 10 best-selling albums of all time.”
12. Coat of Many Colors – Dolly Parton
“Parton’s most homespun hit (and her frequently avowed favorite) effortlessly transplants the biblical story of Joseph to the postwar Tennessee of Dolly’s girlhood, celebrating the unselfconscious pride in a patchwork garment her mama fashioned out of rags. Parton wrote the song on Porter Wagoner’s tour bus – and on Porter Wagoner’s dry cleaning receipt, the only paper handy when inspiration struck. Wagoner later framed that receipt.”
11. Coal Miner’s Daughter – Loretta Lynn
“This autobiographical reminiscence was a gear-shift for Lynn, who’d made her name by feistily fending off hordes of honky-tonk homewreckers out to bed her man. The song originally rambled for six minutes and eight verses before producer Owen Bradley got out his red pen, excising a scene of Lynn’s mother hanging movie magazines on their cabin wall as well as other homey details. It’s country music’s definitive started-from-the-bottom anthem, climaxing with one of popular music’s most stirring key changes.”
10. Crazy – Patsy Cline
“Written for Billy Walker, this jukebox jackpot got to Patsy Cline through husband Charlie Dick, a Willie Nelson crony from Tootsie’s Orchid Lounge on Nashville’s Music Row. After hearing Nelson’s demo (am emulation of Floyd Tillman’s “I Gotta Have My Baby Back”), Dick immediately drove the songwriter home to wake up Cline. She initially judged Nelson’s tune too slow, too mannered and unflattering but nonetheless nailed her heart-stopping, self-interrogating vocal in a single.”
9. Folsom Prison Blues – Johnny Cash
“California’s second oldest state prison was a brutal place before the state implemented much-need penal reforms in 1944. Johnny Cash learned of that dark period at a screening of the 1951 film Inside the Walls of Folsom Prison, while serving with the U.S. Air Force, stationed in Germany. Cash initially recorded the song for Sun Records in 1956, but the version he performed 12 years later for Folsom’s inmates became the iconic hit.”
8. I Will Always Love You – Dolly Parton
“I never get tired of this song… The whole story to how she ended up writing the songs just makes me fall deply inlove with the song more… Dolly is a remarkable women, her legacy will live forever. Dolly Parton is honestly the Queen of Country. Aside from Patsy of course! But not many people realize that Dolly is true country and at heart, she’s never left home”
7. I Walk The Line – Johnny Cash
“Cash’s first No. 1 hit on the Billboard chart managed to keep itself on the radar for 43 weeks. Cash said the song was his ‘pledge of devotion’ to new wife Vivian Liberto, and, oh, it was written backstage in one night.”
6. Love Story – Taylor Swift
“So young & so talented. Taylor Swift is able to surprise us with her voice & her expressions. She is a truly inspiring person, being able to sing, play instruments, has her own band. This song shows that Taylor Swift has talent being able to blend the song with country & pop to create country pop is just phenomenal.”
5. A Country Boy Can Survive – Hank Williams, Jr.
“Even people who don’t listen to country music have heard this song. Though all these are good songs. I’ve heard them all. Country boy can survive is definitely one of the best. Heck it is even quoted in other songs.”
4. Ring of Fire – Johnny Cash
“Country music rebel Johnny Cash was at his best when taking extreme measures: all-black clothing, performing for felons, and singing about unbridled love with flames to illustrate his point. Written by songwriter Merle Kilgore and June Carter (or Cash himself, according to less savory accounts about the lyrics’ meaning) the song was originally recorded as an acoustic folk tune called “(Love’s) Ring of Fire” by June’s sister, Anita Carter. When it didn’t net her a hit, Cash retooled the arrangement with mariachi horns, electric guitar and his barreling voice – backed by Mother Maybelle and the Carter sisters. After its 1963 release, the Number One reign of “Fire” on the country charts lasted seven weeks.”
3. I’m So Lonesome I Could Cry – Hank Williams, SR
“They gave Hank Williams a Pulitzer Prize because his songs were poetry…With imagery, “The moon just went behind a cloud to hide his face and cry. Lots more in that one song.” “Silence of a falling star lights up a purple sky” and trains whining, and more. And the voice carries the loneliness and pain. Not for history’s sake, but for its own merits.”
2. The Dance – Garth Brooks
“What I think this song means is that you can’t have the good without the bad. “I could of missed the pain, but I’d of have to missed the dance.” After the dance he had with that girl, she later broke up with him. He could of missed the pain of her breaking up with him, but he would of had to miss the dance he shared with her. He’s glad that the dance happened. We should apply this to our lives. If something bad happens there will be something good happening, or if something good happens there could be a bad. It keeps going around and around. I’m not so sure if this is the real meaning of this song, but this is what it means to me.”
1. He Stopped Loving Her Today – George Jones
“It is rather simple: which of the songs on this list is about the only thing that ultimately matters (love), and which of these songs deeply touches your heart and forces you tonight back tears? Only one song listed here has this power. “He stopped Loving Her Today, ” with simple, true lyrics, and with George’s perfect phrasing and beautiful, deep, emotional voice, is the best of all time.”
