(SI) Released on May 17, 2005, the late Toby Keith's ninth album Honkytonk University turns 20 this week. To mark the occasion, the classic, platinum-selling album has been made available in immersive Dolby Atmos, mixed by preeminent engineer Mills Logan.
Concurrently, the videos for the album's trio of country hits - "Big Blue Note," "Honkytonk U" and the No. 1 smash, "As Good As I Once Was" - have been remastered and can now be enjoyed in HD. Listen and view here.
As the recent TikTok surge of the album's "As Good As I Once Was" illustrates, music lovers of all ages continue to discover and embrace Keith's music. Twelve years into his career, Honkytonk University sprung from a conversation around Keith's support for Oklahoma University. "I want my kids to go to OU, and I'm tight with some of the people there," Keith said at the time. "Over the holidays somebody asked me if I went there and I said no ... I graduated from the school of hard knocks. I went to Honkytonk U. It just sounded like a title."
Keith wrote that song by himself - as he did one other on the album ("She Left Me") - and he's credited on the other 10 songs as well. Frequent collaborators Scotty Emerick and Dean Dillon share co-writing credits, and Keith produced the album with DreamWorks/Nashville head James Stroud.
The aforementioned "Big Blue Note," written with Emerick, is one of several standouts. "I've never written anything quite like it," Keith said. "It's just one of those things that happens to you as a songwriter. You're going to write enough of them that one's going to end up psychedelic."
Regarding "As Good As I Once Was," which went on to be a six-week No. 1, 3x platinum, and was BMI's "Song of the Year" for 2006, Keith called it, "Probably my favorite song on the album. I can always tell when I've got a special one as soon as I get done."
That predictive ability likely comes from earning a doctorate at Honkytonk U.
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