March 14, 1999

He has built his entire career on his country boy imagine. Moving to Nashville from Oklahoma in the mid-80's, Garth met the same resistance as other performers. He just got lucky. He often admits to being in the right place at the right time. Garth built his career one fan at a time, hitting the road with a passion. It started out slow but when the lightning bolt hit, it lit up the sky. When the smoke cleared, country music didn't know
what hit them. Garth was consistantly placing albums at the top of both the pop and country charts.

Though "good 'ol boy" stories were abundant, other stories about Garths' darker side were also beginning to surface. It was his need for power and control that seemed to be his downfall. Regular disagreements with his bosses at Capitol Records often led to them being fired and replaced with Garth's friends. As I've said before, I don't see anything wrong with this. If Capitol Records will let him do these things, then they have no one to blame but themselves. It's his career, if he doesn't take care of it, who will? Many other music superstars have been just as demanding, why should Garth be any different?

The big news now is his recent release of "Garth Double Live," a 2 CD set chronicling his previous world tours. It  contains 25 songs recorded live at various stops around the country. Each CD will have the same music, but there will be several options regarding the artwork for each package.  The different artwork will be retired after a run of 1 million copies, resulting in a completely different package for every million copies produced in the U.S.

As expected, the 2 CD set includes most of his biggest hits like "Shameless," "Much Too Young," "Rodeo," "That Summer," "If Tomorrow Never Comes" and "The Dance." It also has live versions of concert favorites like "Ain't Going Down," "Papa Loved Mama," "The Fever" and "The River." Of course, there's the long versions of "Thunder Rolls" and "Friends In Low
Places." And, three new songs make their debut here, "It's Your Song," "Tearin' It Up" and "Wild As The Wind," a duet with Trisha Yearwood. Songs were recorded from tours starting in 1991 through 1998. It's an exciting live collection, with crowd noise kept to a minimum and his vocals mixed way out front. Obviously a fun time was had by all on this album.

With intitial orders for 6 million copies, this means fans will have six different covers to chose from. Cover number one has Garth surrounded by flags from various countries. Inside is a pictorial overview of the biggest events in his career. Cover number two features Garth at the concert in Central Park. The booklet captures the highlights of that magical night.
Cover number three pictures Garth crowd surfing at Croke Park in Dublin. The insert booklet documents that trip abroad. Cover number four highlights his 1996-98 World Tour. The booklet highlights this phase of his career. Cover number five was shot at Texas Stadium in 1993. The booklet captures the events for his second NBC-TV special, "This Is Garth Brooks, Too." The sixth and final cover was shot at the Reunion Arena in Dallas in 1991. It pictures Garth and Ty England smashing guitars on stage. The booklet details the events of his first NBC-TV special, "This Is Garth Brooks."

In the days before and after the release of the live CD, his life was a whirlwind of activity. He appeared on Jay Leno on Monday, November 16th, on the 17th he performed a special closed circuit concert for Walmart customers and on the 18th he hosted his sixth NBC special, "Garth Brooks Double Live." He contines the press in December with spots on the "Late Late Show with Tom Synder" on the 4th, "Rosie O'Donnell" on the 7th, "Crook & Chase" on the 9th and "The View" on the 15th.

Few performers work at their career as hard as Garth. So when I hear criticism of his methods, I can't help but say, "The man works hard for his money. He deserves every dime he makes." So, why a live album now? I had the chance to ask him that very question when he played San Antonio recently.  His answer, "Well, I grew up listening to a wide variety of music. Some of my favorite albums were the live ones like KISS, Peter Frampton and Bob Seger. Those albums captured a certain period in their careers when they were at their peak. That's what mine is meant to do. Right now we're playing some of the best music I've ever done. I wanted to capture that forever."