Meet Me in Montana ...

Listening to popular music recorded about Montana, one quickly comes to the conclusion that a surprising proportion of the lyrics are pretty cheesy and ... well, bad. This may be a product of the fact that -- at least until recently -- nearly all of the music about our state was firmly in the country-western genre. (Not that I'm editorializing, or anything ...)

One of the best-known of those songs is "Meet Me in Montana," a duet recorded in 1985 by Dan Seals and Marie Osmond. The song hit #1 on the country charts, and was a much-needed boost for both performers' careers. Like much of the popular music about the state, it played up the idea of Montana as a refuge, a beautiful setting to enjoy a straightforward and honest life ... a place to escape the stress and broken dreams of the big city.

I remember hearing to "Meet Me in Montana" on the radio quite a bit back in the 80s, and having mixed emotions -- happy that a song about my state had made it big, while simultaneously cringing at how awful I thought the music was. But maybe that was just me.

Here's the song's chorus:

Won't you meet me in Montana.
I wanna see the mountains in your eyes.
Woah, woah, I had all of this life I can handle.
Meet me underneath that big Montana sky.