Alan Jackson Honors The Legendary Hank Williams With ‘Midnight In Montgomery’
on Dec 28, 2016 • Updated Apr 13, 2023
It’s no surprise that Alan Jackson is a huge Hank Williams fan. Jackson covers him often and even wrote a song about him, titled “Midnight in Montgomery”.
It is an ode to Williams, who is from Montgomery and buried there.
https://twitter.com/larrypareigis/status/947822246248185857
The song tells the story of when Jackson stopped by Williams’ grave on the way to a New Year’s Eve show.
His lyrics “A drunk man in a cowboy hat took me by surprise/Wearing shiny boots, a Nudi suit, and haunting haunted eyes,” describe his encounter with the ghost of Williams at the grave.
Happy birthday to Hank Williams Sr. Still the most wanted outlaw. pic.twitter.com/4aLbojBXv8
— Steven Masters (@StevenMasters56) September 18, 2018
“Midnight in Montgomery” was released in 1992 as the fourth single from Jackson’s album Don’t Rock the Jukebox. It made it to #3 on the Billboard Hot Country singles charts.
https://twitter.com/larrypareigis/status/1068248497961484288
Jackson went on the popular TV show American Music Shop to perform the song and explained the story that inspired it.
“I’m a big Hank Williams fan. About a year ago, I was traveling around visiting radio stations. I ended up in Montgomery, Alabama. I spent the night there. It was the first time I had ever really been there,” he says. “You know, Hank’s buried there and they got a real nice monument over by his grave. late that night I stopped by to pay my respects to Hank and it was kind of a stormy night in Montgomery. It was kind of a strange feeling being there and got back to Nashville and me and a songwriting friend of mine, Don Sampson, we wrote this song as a tribute to Hank Williams Sr.”
The song is dark and haunting, much different from a lot of Jackson’s material, but it is such fitting tribute to Williams. Watch Jackson’s incredible performance of “Midnight In Montgomery” below.
