“It Must Be Love”
Alan Jackson
Written by Bob McDill
Radio & Records
#1 (1 week)
September 8, 2000
Billboard
#1 (1 week)
September 9, 2000
There’s an irony in the big CMA Awards drama being what’s most closely associated with Under the Influence, Alan Jackson’s covers project from 1999.
When he stormed off the Grand Ole Opry stage after pivoting from “Pop a Top” to “Choices,” he made a bold statement. But on the project itself, Jackson revealed just where his understated approach came from.
Jackson was mostly a quiet public figure, and for all his association with George Jones, it’s easy to hear that Don Williams was a much bigger influence on his approach to material. There’s a quiet dignity to the Williams way, and Jackson wrote himself the kinds of songs that Williams would deliver.
You do hear him pushing up against the limits of the Williams template here. Jackson is too expressive a vocalist to be completely understated in the studio, and he struggles a bit on the verses to keep with the rhythm while also putting some feeling into each line.
But I hear his influences on this cover more than on any of his other hit remakes from over the years.
“It Must Be Love” gets a B+.
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While I never heard Alan cite Don Williams as an influence until I read the booklet accompanying this album, it always seemed to me that Alan’s style owed more than a little to Don Williams. I always liked this song whether by Don Williams in 1979 or Alan Jackson in 2000, but I must admit that it was not my favorite cover from this album. Concur with the B+
I agree with the B+. Both the Don and Alan versions are very good.
I like this version better than Don William’s version, I must admit. It has a brighter, crisper sound, which gives it more energy than Williams’ version, which I appreciate.
I was lukewarm at best about this phase of Alan Jackson’s career when he was putting his fingerprints all over everybody else’s material and redefining it as his own. Sometimes it worked well as it did with his “Pop a Top” cover, which really leaned into Alan’s strengths and, well, popped. Sometimes it worked badly as it did with his lifeless cover of “Who’s Cheatin’ Who?”, smothering all of the personality from Charly McClain’s distinctive original and effectively wiping out its legacy. And other times it worked out just okay as it did here.
“It Must Be Love” wasn’t in my top tier of Don Williams’ favorites but I still preferred the Williams version. Jackson does a decent job on it but doesn’t give the listener a compelling reason why it needs to exist, at least as a #1 on the charts. If a Don Williams cover deserved to go to the top of the charts in 2000, I’d have much preferred Lee Ann Womack’s version of “Lord, I Hope This Day is Good”.
For a songwriter as talented as Alan Jackson, it felt like a pointless cruise control phase of his career to flood the zone with covers. Thankfully, he’d get his mojo back soon thereafter with a string of songs worthy of his 90s heyday.
Grade: B-
I really enjoyed Alan Jackson’s covers album. I love Don Williams. He’s probably my third or fourth favorite artist. But I do think AJ does this song just a tad bit better. Early Jackson might not have always shown the Don Williams influences, but they’re definitely present in his later years. When Somebody Loves You, Remember When, even his cover of Thank God for the Radio feel like Don Williams songs.
As for the album, my favorites are Pop a Top, She Just Started Liking Cheating Songs, My Own Kind of Hat, and The Blues Man.
Is “It Must Be Love” the catchiest country song ever? I think it might be.
I don’t mean that in a bad way.