The SRO Show – Dwight Yoakam
Honky Tonk Man
Produced by Lawrence Standifer Stevens
Written by Joseph E. Casanova
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If you could close your eyes and be any country star you wanted, and be in the movies and on TV. . . who would you be? Well, of course. . . Dwight Yoakam.

Kentucky native Dwight Yoakam stormed the Nashville scene almost 30 years ago with his debut album, a unique collection of alternative country and rockabilly called Guitars, Cadillacs, Etc., Etc.

Yoakam’s 21st studio album, Second Hand Heart, hit record stores last year, which included the folk classic, Man of Constant Sorrow.

Guitars, Cadillacs, Etc., Etc. became the first of his three consecutive #1 albums, followed by Hillbilly Deluxe in ’87 and Buenas Noches From A Lonely Room the next year.

He landed in the top five with the Johnny Horton-penned single, Honky Tonk Man, and from Just Lookin’ For a Hit, the infectious track, Long White Cadillac.

The set also included Bury Me, a duet with former Lone Justice singer, Maria McKee, as well as reworked versions of Johnny Cash’s Ring of Fire and Ray Price’s Heartaches by the Number.

In 1988, he paid homage to the California country scene with a song that featured former Hee-Haw host and icon, Buck Owens — Streets of Bakersfield.

The song became huge in San Antonio due in part to conjunto legend Flaco Jimenez’s signature accordion playing.

Yoakam never forgot his rock-n-roll roots with covers of Cheap Trick’s I Want You to Want Me and my personal favorite, made famous in Nicholas Cage’s Honeymoon in Vegas in 1992 — Elvis’ Suspicious Minds.

The Grammy winner also found success on the big screen. He drew critical acclaim for his portrayal of an abusive, live-in boyfriend in Billy Bob Thornton’s Swing Blade in 1996 and the psychotic killer in 2002 in Jodie Foster’s Panic Room.

The following year, he continued his momentum with roles as a police detective in Harrison Ford’s Hollywood Homicide and a sheriff in The Three Burials of Melquiades Estrada in 2005.

He even invaded the small screen in the 2010’s by playing recurring characters in Fox’s comedy Wilfred and CBS’s syfy epic Under the Dome.

Whether it’s music, movies or TV, Dwight Yoakam proves he’s more than just Guitars and Cadillacs. . . Etc., Etc.