Garth Brooks…In the Life of Chris Gaines is a collection of thirteen songs, eleven of which are billed as Gaines's "greatest hits" plus two of Gaines's new songs. Just who is Chris Gaines? According to a lengthy biography in the liner notes, Gaines is a thirty-two year old Brisbane-born musician with a tumultuous past. Liner notes reference a musical career fraught with tragedy: "decided to quit school his senior year...to pursue his music professionally"; "joined the band CRUSH…success short-lived when lead singer Tommy Levitz died in a plane crash"; "father died in the fall of 1990 after his long battle with cancer…almost a year to the day later, Chris released Fornucopia…a dark and angry album"; "Chris was involved in a violent single-car crash that nearly ended his life…spent six weeks in the hospital and over two years undergoing extensive plastic surgery…wouldn't allow himself to be seen or photographed." Despite the elaborate bio, Chris Gaines is more than a figment of Brooks's imagination: Chris Gaines is Garth Brooks in an essay of megalomania run amok.
Gaines, perhaps, is the alter-Garth - not the crooning, hat-wearing Garth Brooks who emerged onto the country music scene early nineties with such hits as "The Dance," "Friends in Low Places," and "Unanswered Prayers" - but Garth as rock and roll superstar, back on the music scene with this collection of "hits."
Brooks leaves no stone unturned in his fantasy concept album. In addition to the extensive biography, the jacket features cover art from Gaines's earlier albums, Triangle, Apostle, Fornucopia and Straightjacket, as well as a photo of the short-lived band CRUSH. While we are spared the lyrics, each song has a handwritten, first-person vignette explaining why it was written, as told by the fictional Chris.
Alas, Chris Gaines is more than a name. Brooks himself, in heavy makeup, a shaggy black wig and soul patch, poses for the cover photo, and graces the interior in a Mick Jagger-style suit, leather, and even circa eighties Spandex, as the "New Chris." Notes cite four other male models used as the 1986-1992 Chris. There are definite Spinal Tap elements at work (e.g., the cleavage on the Fornucopia album cover, the straightjacket and scantily-clad nurses on the Straightjacket album art, and, of course, the spandex pants), but the Spinal Tap parody and humor are conspicuously absent. It appears that Brooks is serious.
Musically, the album is a disjointed collection of thirteen songs. "Driftin' Away" and "That's the Way I Remember it" are standard adult contemporary fare, unremarkable except that the latter sounds like Garth Brooks doing Garth Brooks.
The album's new offerings "Lost in You" and "Right Now" are equally bland. The songs do have realistic 90s elements. ("Lost in You" could be the sequel to Eric Clapton's "Change the World" while "Right Now" features a rap, or "vocal chant" as it is referenced in the notes, speculating the causes of youth violence, before exploding into the chorus from the Youngbloods' "Get Together.")
What is remarkable about the album is the tawdry, not-so-subtle rip-offs of songs past. "Main Street" is Chris's answer to Dylan's "Knockin' on Heaven's Door"; "Maybe" would be better titled "Maybe I'll Try to Improve on The Beatles"; "My Love Tells Me So" has elements of Chicago-style brass and vocals. The most puzzling of the pseudo covers is "Digging for Gold" which begins as Fleetwood Mac's "The Chain" but features a take on Pink Floyd's "Young Lust" ("This is the United States Calling. Are we reaching?") While the rehashed music is, at times, unsettling, "White Flag" and "Way of the Girl," easily the two weakest tracks, are downright annoying. Both contain repetitive, inane lyrics, unimaginative, heavily synthesized music, perhaps representative of Chris's offerings to the barren landscape of eighties music.
"It Don't Matter to the Sun" a standard love song, is somewhat redeeming, as it could easily go undetected on a Garth Brooks as Garth Brooks album. Even so, one must wonder -- if this is the "best of," what didn't make the cut? Lyrically, these thirteen songs fluctuate between passable ("It Don't Matter to the Sun" is a country radio dream: "it ain't gonna stop the world if you walk out the door / this old world would just keep turning 'round / like it did before" and then concludes, "it don't matter to the sun / but it matters to me") and downright inane ("do you love me baby / do you want me to hold / or are you just diggin' for gold").
While Brooks has fashioned several of the songs into believable takes on the music from past performers, he has overextended his reach in terms of emulating the lyrics. What to Bob Dylan was "Take this gun from me / I can't shoot it anymore" is to Brooks "One light blinking off and on / blood of life in this town is gone." The Beatles's famous "A Day in the Life" ("I read the news today, oh boy / about a lucky man who'd made the grave / and though the news was rather sad / I just had to laugh") is replaced in "Maybe" ("Yesterday the odds were stacked in favor of my expedition / flying above the rest/never falling from the nest.") Brooks can certainly make a few words rhyme, but the songs lack any degree of depth.
Far more interesting than any of the music contained herein is the question: Why the Chris Gaines mask?
A recent episode of The Daily Show suggested this concept album was Garth's way of "finally getting a full head of hair." Given Brooks's penchant for outrageousness (e.g., "outing" his own sister; re-staffing his record label with yes-men), it's a distinct possibility. Chris Gaines could be the product of sheer boredom on Brooks's part. Perhaps country music no longer provides a challenge. After all, hasn't he achieved the pinnacle of superstardom? The RIAA recently certified Brooks the second largest selling act of the decade, sandwiching him between the Beatles and Elvis Presley, respectively.
Does this give Garth Brooks license to copy, loot, and pillage? Quite possibly, Brooks borrows from both The Beatles and Presley. The Chris Gaines concept itself, though less imaginative, has elements of the "Paul is Dead" hoax (the car crash, extensive plastic surgery, the replica of "A Day in the Life"). As the cover warns, Garth is about to make his foray into acting ("The Pre-Soundtrack to the movie The Lamb.") If Brooks's November 13, 1999, appearance on Saturday Night Live is any indication, we're in store for a movie of roughly the same caliber as the Elvis movies.
But, Chris Gaines could be more than a product of boredom: Gaines could well be an outgrowth of Brooks's dark side. Chris's fake biography highlights tragedy upon tragedy (the plane crash, the violent car crash.). Photos show a scowling, sullen Chris clad in all black, with the exception of the white straightjacket on the Fornucopia cover. Song explanations are equally grim - "Right Now" was inspired by a "slaughtering of innocence"; "Snow in July" about a "good relationship gone bad"; "Driftin' Away" answered Gaines's "why to some does loneliness feel so good?"; "It don't matter to the sun" was a song Chris's father sang to his mother, "after my father's death, my mother had no one to sing this song to her"; "White Flag" mentions an episode when Chris "found (himself) in the middle of Matoya valley, standing on the hood of (his) car, fists clenched, screaming to the heavens"; "Maybe" is a tribute to CRUSH-member Tommy Levitz; "I used to go out a lot to where Tommy's plane crashed in northern New Mexico…I talked to Tommy there."
Brooks's Garth-as-Garth music shows fleeting glimpses into this fascination with death and the dark side. "The Thunder Rolls" tells the story of a battered wife exacting revenge by murdering her abusive husband. (In the video, Brooks appears disguised as the husband.) "Papa Loved Mama" though uptempo, is a grim tale of a disgruntled husband who kills his philandering wife. Brooks appears to have more than a passing fascination with death and mortality. He has a mild obsession with the death of rodeo star Lane Frost, featured in the video to "The Dance" along with Martin Luther King, and JFK. "If Tomorrow Never Comes" depicts Brooks as a man grappling with his own mortality.
Possibly, this concept album has given Brooks carte blanche to explore that dark side. The cloak of Chris Gaines may provide that vehicle through which Garth can explore death, mortality, loneliness and loss, without the risk of alienating the fans who like the softer side of Garth.
Finally, and probably the best answer to why this concept album exists may be the simplest answer of all. Put yourself in Garth's boots. Imagine you've sold millions of albums, have legions of dedicated fans. You're bored. You want to branch out, try something new, maybe create your own bridge into a career in rock and roll. Maybe you're insecure. Rather than reinvent yourself, wouldn't the Chris Gaines fake persona make one hell of a safety net?