Honky-tonker Aaron Tippin grumbled at the cost to fill up his minivan when gas prices were at their highest last summer.
"A hundred bucks to fill up my van makes me mad," he said, then quickly put it in context for his less-financially fortunate neighbor: "It takes two days groceries from his family."
"Don't get me on my soapbox," he warned in a phone interview last week from Nashville to preview his show Saturday at Desert Diamond Casino.
Tippin, though, has never completely gotten off that soapbox. He has spent his 20-year country music career standing up for the common man — from the desperate farmers to the desolate miners to those men and women fighting to preserve our freedoms.
Now he's carrying the flag of American truckers with his new indie record "In Overdrive," a collection of covers of long-forgotten trucking songs from "East Bound and Down" to "Long White Line." The record also includes Tippin's self-penned anthem, "Drill Here, Drill Now," which he wrote with his wife Thea. It's the couple's message to politicians to ease up on domestic oil drilling restrictions.
The album, aside from being a nostalgic romp through a sorely neglected genre of country music, has a not-so-subtle political message delivered in Tippin's twangy baritone and wrapped in delicious steel guitar and fiddle.
"(Truckers) were getting their teeth kicked in by high fuel prices. I was talking to them on my radio from my bus. I know they were suffering. I was talking to them at the truck stops," the 50-year-old said in his fast-clipped Southern drawl. "Consequently, I thought I needed to say something, do something."
"Drill Here, Drill Now" joins other Tippin anthems including the hit "Where the Stars and Stripes and the Eagle Flies" and his debut single "You've Got to Stand for Something," written to honor the soldiers in the first Gulf War.
Tippin has mostly gotten away with politicizing in his music, largely because his opinions and causes fit nicely with Nashville's family values mantra. But he admits he doubts anyone on Music Row, including his old label homes Lyric Street and RCA Nashville, would have allowed him to record "Drill Here," whose message takes aim at American politicians succumbing to foreign oil producers rather than allow more domestic drilling.
The song concludes with this chilling warning: "Somethin's gotta be done right now 'cuz friends it won't be long / Before this great big country comes grinding to a halt."
"I think I'm speaking for the voice of common America," Tippin said. "I am one of them, cut from the same cloth. I think that's why it works for me. I wasn't born with a silver spoon in my mouth. I learned to weld in high school. I was raised on a farm. I know what work's like and busting your tail every day.
"And you're right, I can't keep my mouth shut."
Tippin released "In Overdrive" on his own label, Nippit — his last name spelled backward. Über Nashville producer James Stroud produced the album.
"It's really a great partnership making the music I want to make. And it's really cool. I didn't have a music exec breathing down my neck," Tippin said of striking out on his own.
"I'm back to having fun. I get to crash the train myself," he added. "Crash or not, I got the wheel."
If you go
• What: Aaron Tippin in concert.
• When: 7 p.m. Saturday.
• Where: Desert Diamond Casino, 1100 W. Pima Mine Road, at Interstate 19.
• Tickets: $18 in advance, $23 day of show, www.ticketmaster.com.
• Et cetera: This is the unofficial Tucson Rodeo concert. The rodeo continues with competition through Sunday at the Tucson Rodeo Grounds, 4823 S. Sixth Ave. Gates open daily at 11 a.m. Details: www.tucson rodeo.com.
