A native of Vidor, Texas, Country Music singer Tracy Lynn Byrd (1966-) got his break in music when he sang a karaoke version of Hank Williams' "Your Cheatin' Heart" at a shopping mall. This led to him joining a talent show and then dropping out of college to form a band whose members previously included Mark Chesnutt.
Byrd's first trip to Nashville was unsuccessful, but his second landed him a contract with MCA Nashville. While his first two singles — "That's the Thing About a Memory" and a cover of Johnny Paycheck's "Someone to Give My Love To" — both bombed, he hit #1 on Hot Country Songs in 1993 with "Holdin' Heaven". A self-titled disc for MCA that year went gold.
His commercial breakthrough was 1994's No Ordinary Man. His most commercially successful album, it included his career-defining songs "Watermelon Crawl" and "The Keeper of the Stars". Three more studio albums would follow to modest success before he left MCA in favor of RCA Records in 1999. While his first RCA album was unsuccessful, his second landed him his second #1 hit with "Ten Rounds with Jose Cuervo". Follow-ups failed, and he exited RCA only one album later. He has sporadically continued to record since, primarily for smaller independent labels.
Byrd is an example of the 1990s "hat act" style of country, defined mainly by uptempo line-dance novelties (such as "Watermelon Crawl" and "I'm from the Country") interspersed with sensitive ballads.
Albums
- Tracy Byrd (1993)
- No Ordinary Man (1994)
- Love Lessons (1995)
- Big Love (1996)
- I'm from the Country (1998)
- Keepers: Greatest Hits (1999)
- It's About Time (1999)
- Ten Rounds (2001)
- The Truth About Men (2003)
- Greatest Hits (2005)
- Different Things (2006)
- All American Texan (2016)
Tropes present in his work:
- Dance Sensation: "Watermelon Crawl" is about a dance invented at a fictional watermelon festival.
- Dead Sparks: "I Wanna Feel That Way Again" has the narrator longing for the sensations he used to feel while in love.
- Enormous Engagement Ring: Defied in "Don't Love Make a Diamond Shine", which states that the meaning behind a wedding ring is more important than its commercial value:Don't love make a diamond shine
It don't matter if it costs a dime
Dang thing looks like a million bucks
Sittin' on the hand of a girl in love
A perfect fifteen carat
Is duller than dirt if the heart don't wear it
With three little words it'll knock you blind
Don't love make a diamond shine - Men Are Uncultured: Referenced in "The Truth About Men", which contains the line "We ain't wrong, we ain't sorry, and it's probably gonna happen again."
- Ode to Intoxication: "Ten Rounds with Jose Cuervo" has the narrator taking joy in drowning his sorrows, and then getting so drunk that he's lost count of how many shots he's had.
- Rearrange the Song: "The Keeper of the Stars" was re-recorded for the radio edit.
- Revenge Ballad: In "Revenge of a Middle Aged Woman", a woman sells her ex's Corvette for a ridiculously low price and then marries the guy who buys it.
