Every #1 Country Single of the Eighties: Clint Black, “A Better Man”

“A Better Man”

Clint Black

Written by Clint Black and Hayden Nicholas

Radio & Records

#1 (1 week)

May 19, 1989

Billboard

#1 (1 week)

June 10, 1989

Clint Black’s first No. 1 single heralds the official arrival of nineties country.

Black is of Texas origin, though he was born in New Jersey and lived there for the first few months of his life before his family moved back home. A self-taught musician, he was proficient as a singer, guitarist, and harmonica player by his high school years, playing in a band with his brothers. He drew on several musical styles early on, but fully committed to country music in the early eighties.

His local circuit work eventually introduced him to longtime collaborator Hayden Nicholas, and with help from some industry contacts, a demo of their future No. 1 hit “Nobody’s Home” was enough to land Black a deal with RCA Nashville. By the time he recorded his debut album, Killin’ Time, Black had fused his country music with the signature sounds of seventies California rock. That sound, coupled with Black’s sophisticated contemporary songwriting, laid down the formula for nineties country and served as a clarion call to baby boomers looking for a musical home.

It’s actually striking listening to “A Better Man” through the lens of it being Clint Black’s introductory hit. He’s such a Haggard-inspired traditionalist, and the album’s title track has been its most enduring hit, and that track is more representative of Black’s sound than “A Better Man.”

This one is the sugar that helps the medicine go down, prepping new listeners of country music with a smooth pop vocal that isn’t very twangy at all. Same goes for the country instrumentation, which wouldn’t scare away any of the tens of millions of listeners that made the Eagles’ first hits collection the top selling album of all time. The cowboy imagery might be a throwback, but Black is a thoroughly modern man who knows how to rock, but is trying to roll with getting older in a changing world.

The empathy of a Twitty record is there, but Black’s a man coming of age in the era of two income households and an emerging idea that a relationship is stronger if both participants are working on their own personal growth. It made “A Better Man” the first country breakup song of the self-improvement age, and the genre will benefit tremendously by having genuinely better men at its forefront for the next few years.

“A Better Man” gets an A.

Every No. 1 Single of the Eighties

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