Just before Christmas 2005, Mike's youngest daughter, Amanda, (16 at the time) submitted her Christmas wish list with a very unusal gift request. Of course, there were normal teeange girl items listed on the sheet but one of the wishes was for her dad to write a song for her. She had asked before but never on a Christmas wish list so Mike decided it was probably time to sit down and get this done.

Anyone who is familiar with Amanda knows that she is vivacious and full of life, always smiling and making friends, and people never had to wonder what was on her mind because she's be quick to tell them.  So this song had to be something upbeat, something sort of tough and sassy, something that made people feel good and would leave them smiling too.

So Mike grabbed a guitar, an old pawn shop Fender electric (oddly enough, the guitar was a previous Christmas gift from his wife Tonya and it was blue too) and worked out the chords as the first of the lyrics came to him. Mike was just goofing around with a standard twelve-bar blues boogie and throwing lines out there for Amanda's approval.

Mike was asked to write a song for Amanda and there were no specifics.  It could be about anything he wanted to write about but, as they sat there laughing and joking, the song began to emerge virtually on its own.  Mike was looking at Amanda, with her bright green eyes and fashionably torn "designer" jeans when he sang, "Well my blue jean baby's got big green eyes," and that inevitably earned him a smile from Amanda and the smile illuminated the way for the next few lines.

"Make ya' smile like a Cracker Jack toy surprise.  A heart that's made of solid gold, she ain't too shy and she ain't too bold.  "See her comin' better step aside.  She's my blue jean baby with big green eyes."

By now, Tonya had joined them as they "worked" on the tune so it was really becoming a lot of fun.  Amanda was scribbling down the lyrics as they were completed and, since he apparently now had a subject for this little diddy, Mike just kept his focus on Amanda to finish the song.

The next line went, "Well my blue jean baby's got long brown hair and when the boys see her they just stop and stare.  (Insert another smile here) Just to see a flash of that winning smile, well a country boy would walk a country mile."  That line seemed to work and, so far so good, the lyrics seemed to meet with Amanda's approval.  Now for a way to round out the second verse.  "She ain't got no worries, ain't got no cares.  She's my blue jean baby with long brown hair."

"This was never meant to be a serious song at all and, at the time, it was never thought that it would ever be recorded."

Now he was headed into a chorus so he decided he'd include her mom and himself.  Tonya was a sheriff's office dispatcher (technically referred to as a "telecommunications operator" and Mike was a small-town police chief on his way to being an elected Constable.  So, just out of the "blue," Mike sang, "Hey operator get me 9-1-1, here comes daddy with his shotgun.  Sirens screamin', blue lights everywhere and the bad boys know there's some tension in the air.  Hit the ground runnin' and I don't mean maybe, well ya' better not mess with my blue jean baby."

Amanda wrote it down and they were all having a great time.  Tonya reasonably asked why an operator had to dial 9-1-1 and why anybody would ask an operator to dial 9-1-1 when they could just dial the number themselves.  Mike replied, "Well maybe they forgot the number and just needed some assistance!"

The "shotgun" line came from that old story about how a daddy sits on the front porch cleaning his shotgun and watching the clock while his daughter is on a date.  Anybody can ask Amanda and she'll be sure to confirm that seldom were the times when her dad actually approved of the boys his daughters dated and, being the police officer that he was, he often reminded their dates that he wasn't just another dad by singing the theme from the television show "COPS" entitled "Bad Boys" by Inner Circle.  So, between the "9-1-1" line and the "Bad Boys" line the song was now becoming more of an inside story and probably wouldn't make sense to some people when they heard it.  But that was okay, this was Amanda's song.

"So, between the "9-1-1" line and the "Bad Boys" line the song was now be- coming more of an inside story and probably wouldn't make sense to some people when they heard it.  But that was okay, this was Amanda's song."

Mike had made it through the first two verses and added a chorus and was now headed into a third verse so he wanted to incorporate more of Amanda's personality so he was stopping and starting, asking questions and filling up the next verse.  He asked Amanda to tell him what kind of care she dreamed of having and she said that she wanted a red Ford Mustang convertible.  So the next line was, "Well my blue jean baby's got a red Mustang, convertible top and a lotta bling-bling."

Now that "bling-bling" line brought a huge round of laughter because nobody expected DAD to come up with something like that.  "It was hard to come up with something that rhymed with Mustang so I just sang the first thing that came to mind," Mike said.  He was a Texas Peace Officer, with all that this implies, western hat, boots, Ranger belt and he was singing about "bling-bling."  Amanda was actually surprised he even knew the term but he was quick to remind her that the house was usually filled with the R&B / Hip-Hop sounds from BET and MTV, programs that Amanda loved, on the weekends and that's how he came to be familiar with "bling-bling."

At this point, Mike could picture Amanda cruisin' down the highway in this imaginary red Mustang convertible with the top down and the wind in her hair.  She HAD to be listening to the radio so he stopped and asked who were some of her favorite singers.  Amanda gave him a few names and the next lines were "Pat Green playin' on the radio.  Kid Rock sittin' there waitin' in the hole."  There was no better way to end the verse than to say, "She knows she's bound for fortune and fame.  She's my blue jean baby with a red Mustang."

Heading back into the chorus, a few changes were made.  Mike was still using the operator to dial 9-1-1 but now "Momma's sendin' Daddy with his shotgun."  Since every serious law enforcement situation requires a back-up officer Mike added, "She'll be there just backin' him up," and since she didn't drive a police car he threw his own truck in the mix, "In a four-wheel-drive Chevy pickup truck."  The second chorus went on to say, "Momma tells the boys that they gotta be crazy 'cause ya' better not mess with the blue jean baby."  Mike tagged the song by going back to the first chorus, "Hit the ground runnin' and I don't mean maybe.  You better not mess with my blue jean baby."

So there it was, "Blue Jean Baby" was born.  It was scribbled on the front and back of a single sheet of notebook paper complete with scratch-outs and doodles.  One less gift under the tree since Amanda now had her song.  Mike asked Tonya if she thought he could get by with doing the same thing for the rest of the kids and grandchildren.  "I doubt it," she smiled.  "Me too," he replied.

Writing music was, at that time, a hobby for Mike because he never would have dreamed it would have been possible to record anything he'd ever written.  Six months later that would all change when he was reunited with his childhood and lifelong friend Sammy Hundley.

It would still be another 14 months before the demo track was recorded but that was okay with Amanda because she knew the song was written and she knew it was all hers. When "Blue Jean Baby" was finally done, well, it was indeed found to be a rockabilly rocker complete  with smokin' guitars (including some very phenominal slide work) by Sammy Hundley. Mike wanted the song to have a modern jitterbug tone accompanied by the sound of a 1950's Elvis & Jerry Lee slapback on the mic. The results far exceeded Mike's expectations . . . but not Amanda's.

Since the song was produced with backing vocals, Mike tried and tried to get Amanda to do some of those vocals but there was NO way that was going to happen.  It was her song and he just wanted her to be somewhere on the recording.  Thus, the final line of the song is Amanda saying, "I'm tellin' my dad."

She seemed to always know that "Blue Jean Baby" would crank itself out just the way it did. It was a Christmas gift from a dad to a daughter and it turned out to be both timeless and priceless.

"Blue Jean Baby" found it's way to becoming the first track on Mike's first solo album entitled "Texas in the Man."  Since then, "Blue Jean Baby" has seen much radio airplay in the U.S. and throughout the world but primarily in Europe where the tune actually made the European Country Music Association National Top 40.

Mike Parrish

Texas in the Man

Hangin' Boot Records 2007

Willow Street Entertainment Group

THE STORY BEHIND THE SONG