Watch Bobby Bare’s Heart-Wrenching ‘I Drink’ Video

Country legend Bobby Bare is an artist well-regarded for his songwriting, but he also knows the value of recording songs from other sources, having scored a Top Ten hit in 1963 with the Mel Tillis-Danny Dill classic “Detroit City.” Last May, when Bare recorded Things Change, his first LP of new music in five years, he sang a duet with Chris Stapleton and contributed his own compositions to the project, but also covered songs by Max T. Barnes, Guy Clark and Mary Gauthier.

Gauthier, in fact, was the source of two tracks on the album, including her thought-provoking and timely “Mercy Now,” and the devastating “I Drink.” A shattering meditation on the cycle of alcohol abuse and addiction, “I Drink” benefits from Bare’s intensely weathered vocal and Gauthier’s simple yet incisive lyrics. The clip also features a brief cameo appearance from the song’s writer.

“‘I Drink’ was written by one of my favorite songwriters, Mary Gauthier – she lived it,” Bare says. “It’s a heart-wrenching story of alcoholism and the effects it can have on a family. I am proud of the depiction of the song through this video and hope it will sincerely touch people. If you’re struggling, get help, it could save your family and your life. I recommend AA as a starting point.”

“I Drink,” which has previously been covered by Tim McGraw and Blake Shelton, chronicles Gauthier’s own personal descent into substance abuse, after a troubled childhood in which the orphaned youngster, who was raised in New Orleans, ran away from her adoptive parents’ home in her teens. A DUI in her thirties led to the singer-songwriter finally getting sober. On January 26th, Thirty Tigers will release her latest LP, Rifles & Rosary Beads, inspired by her work over the past four-and-a-half years with an Austin-based nonprofit called SongwritingWith:Soldiers. 

A member of the Country Music Hall of Fame, Bobby Bare is currently celebrating 60 years in the music business. Since his 1964 Grammy win for “Detroit City,” he has reached the Top Ten with other hits, including “500 Miles Away From Home” “Miller’s Cave,””(Margie’s at) the Lincoln Park Inn,” “Daddy, What If,” recorded with his then 8-year-old son, Bobby Bare Jr., and nominated for a Grammy in 1974, and the Number One hit “Marie Laveau.” Bare is also known for the groundbreaking, informal talk show Bobby Bare and Friends, which aired on the Nashville Network in the Eighties.