Alabama's Randy Owen discusses the band's inspirations, legacy and new CMT special

Country Music Hall of Famers Alabama are having their legacy as one of the genre's most iconic rock star acts of the past half-century honored via national tour dates and a new CMT special.

"CMT Giants: Alabama" premieres Aug. 15 at 7 p.m. CT, exclusively on CMT.

Cousins Jeff Cook, Teddy Gentry and Randy Owen, born in Fort Payne, Alabama, bridge Southern rock's 1970s-era acts like Lynyrd Skynyrd and the Charlie Daniels Band to country's pop-styled '90s stars like Garth Brooks and Alan Jackson.

Though Cook died in November 2022 at age 73 after battling Parkinson's disease, the band still soldiers on.

'Dixieland Delight'

Blake Shelton partners with Steve Wariner, Pam Tillis pairs with Lorrie Morgan, and Brad Paisley, Jamey Johnson, Jason Aldean, Little Big Town, Old Dominion, Riley Green, and Sam Hunt appear on the two-hour CMT special.

Though intimate compared to their arena shows that still pack in crowds in the tens of thousands, fellow Alabama native Riley Green singing "Dixieland Delight" on the CMT special is an impressive highlight.

"One of my dreams was to play or write a song so well that people in the audience would sing along," Owen says. "It's still emotional to see my dream come true."

In the development of their 1983 classic, the band took songwriter Ronnie Rogers' lyrics about driving an hour south of Nashville in Leiper's Fork and via a few changes in composition inspired by the work of Crosby, Stills, Nash and Young on songs like "Suite: Judy Blue Eyes" developed it as a broader Southern anthem — with sing-along refrains for the crowd included.

'Roll On'

Regarding a song like "Roll On," which was covered by Old Dominion on the special, Owen recalls, at the behest of songwriter Dave Loggins, pulling up in their tour buses at the Music Mill recording studio at Roy Acuff Place on Music Row at 2 a.m. and recording the track on a freezing night in early November in 1983.

A desire to evolve the CB radio-aided trucking song trend past C.W. McCall's 1976 global hit "Convoy," Jerry Reed's "Eastbound and Down" and the fodder for comedic TV shows like "B.J. and the Bear" fueled their interests.

To record the track's trademark CB radio call, the band pulled a live microphone onto one tour bus and recorded the audio from the other. To get the authentic sound of a bus horn and the bus driving off, they recorded the bus previously used to make the CB radio call driving away from the Music Mill.

"People driving by the studio stopped and watched us — they must've thought we were on some heavy drugs," Owen jokes.

'Lady Down on Love'

Owen recalls a heartbreaking moment during a 1976 concert in the club room at the Red Carpet Inn near Western Kentucky University in Bowling Green as the inspiration for "Lady Down on Love."

He was engaging in some stage banter and happened upon a dozen women celebrating the recent divorce of one of their friends.

"Well, I'd really rather be at home with my husband and be in love," said the divorcee, sadly.

Bittersweetly, the night in Bowling Green was also the first night she'd been out partying with her friends since she married at 18. The sadness of seeing young love on the rocks hit Owen hard.

Hopeful for a Music City in-road, Owen wrote a ballad meant for a man to sing (ideally "Just Get Up and Close the Door" hit-maker Johnny Rodriguez) about being at fault for a marriage dissolving.

The group held onto the emotive ballad for seven years. Upon its 1983 release, it was a country chart-topper.

'Mountain Music'

Insofar as platinum-seller "Mountain Music," Owen "took forever" to encapsulate the unique energy that bluegrass and folk music hold over small-town residents of the area between Lookout Mountain and Chattanooga, Tennessee.

He finally stopped, thought about his childhood in DeKalb County, Alabama, and the following poured from his soul:

"Swim across the river / Just to prove that I'm a man / Spend the day bein' lazy / Just bein' nature's friend / Climb a long tall hick'ry / Bend it over, skinnin' cats / Playin' baseball with chert rocks / Usin' sawmill slabs for bats."

In Owen's mind, to work ideally, the song needed to have a triple-lead bluegrass-style vocal, fiddles and a rock-styled drum solo in its composition, too.

Similarly, songs like "Song of the South," "I'm in a Hurry," "Cheap Seats" and "My Home's in Alabama" served to evolve country past its countrypolitan and traditional eras.

'A community based on Southern-inspired country music'

While discussing the development of "Lady Down on Love," Owen makes an off-handed comment about fashion. It ultimately speaks to something more profound about the group.

"We used to be dressed like doctors — gosh, that was awful."

Instead of their traditional T-shirts and jeans, at the time, they saw fit to dress the quartet in suits similar to the ones by Hollywood fashion designer Harvey Krantz that the Oak Ridge Boys (then having mega-success with "Y'all Come Back Saloon") and Kenny Rogers wore to curry favor with country music's crossover mainstream popularity.

Five years later, they were being booked by live event icon George Moffett at fairs nationwide.

Their style, like their sound, had evolved.

Before they played at suburban Chicago's short-lived Poplar Creek Music Theater, Owen recalls Moffet asking the band's manager, "Don't you think it's time the boys get their outfits on?"

"What outfits? The boys wear busted-up jeans and whatever T-shirts the audience gives them at the last show," Owen says their manager responded.

"Looking like that, we scared (country traditionalists) to death," he says.

Still laughing, Owen adds a statement of gratitude for Alabama's legacy.

"It's beautiful to be able to give the world a community based on Southern-inspired country music. To do that and still take no prisoners when we're on stage, anywhere we play in the world, it's all magical."

This article originally appeared on Nashville Tennessean: Country Hall of Famer Alabama's CMT special airs Aug. 15. How to watch