Book Review: 33 1/3: Garth Brooks…In The Life Of Chris Gaines

Release Date: November 28, 2024

Garth Brooks’ spell as Chris Gaines remains one of music history’s most confusing yet fascinating moments. Brooks introduced his moody alter ego in 1999 with his sole album Garth Brooks In…The Life of Chris Gaines. Brooks proposed the record as the soundtrack for Gaines’ biopic The Lamb. The fabricated backstory for Gaines hit upon all the rockstar tropes: tragic losses, money issues, a horrific accident, and sex…lots of sex. A surreal Behind the Music special dubbed Behind the Life of Chris Gaines laid out his story from humble beginnings to reviving his career.

The project left audiences confused. To Brooks, this wasn’t an alter ego. He wasn’t trying to sell Gaines and himself as two different acts. They were the same, but different and he asked fans to play along. In the end, no one understood it. Album sales stalled, the movie was shelved, and Brooks returned to honky-tonk country. Strangely enough, the album has a cult following 25 years after its release. Even Brooks looks back on it fondly and will occasionally tease more Gaines music on the horizon. So, what the heck was Chris Gaines?  What was Brooks’ goal with the project? That’s what Stephen Deusner attempts to uncover in his new 33 1/3 book, Garth Brooks In…The Life of Chris Gaines.

Much like Chris Gaines, Deusner blurs the line between fact and fiction when talking about the project. The book begins with the making of the album, the audience’s reaction, and why it ultimately failed. From there, Deusner gives us supposedly outside evidence that gets to the bottom of the Chris Gaines debacle. He presents “lost” liner notes written by a random blogger for a Gaines box set that was scrapped. Later in the book, he provides a transcript of a lecture from Professor Joe Frady who argues with all seriousness that Garth Brooks is the alter ego of Chris Gaines. All this is presented as fact, but is it really? Are these people Desuner in disguise?

While he admits the publication he names in the book, the Crayton County Clarion-Scimitar, doesn’t exist, he remains mum on these sources. A quick Google search comes up empty except for a character named Joe Frady in the 1974 Warren Beatty thriller The Parallax View. These chapters are confusing at first. Going from the Gaines retrospective to a theory that Brooks doesn’t exist leaves you with whiplash. But if you’re willing to play along, you realize what Deusner is trying to achieve. Taking a page from Brooks, Deusner seemingly creates these sources in an attempt to uncover who the real Garth Brooks is.

Lurking beneath Gaines’ tragic backstory and accusations of Brooks not existing is the real story of a country musician who skyrocketed to fame in the 90s, was never comfortable with his success, and struggled to define where Garth Brooks the megastar started and where the meat-and-potatoes Troyal Garth Brooks ended. Referencing several interviews by Brooks, Deusner highlights how Brooks thought about the man on stage as someone outside of himself. That was Garth Brooks. He was GB, who hated heights, was a daydreamer, and wanted to spend days lazing on the couch. In this sense, Brooks always played a character; Chris Gaines just takes things a step further. Gaines is an extension of the real Brooks. For Brooks, Gaines wasn’t an alter ego as many proclaimed. Chris Gaines is Garth Brooks, which he tried (and failed) to emphasize when discussing the project. Rather than treat Gaines as its own entity, he spoke about it as a “Garth Brooks project.” Listeners weren’t supposed to view the two as separate. Though the two were different, Gaines still represented who Brooks thought himself to be. So why create an entirely different character for one album?

Critics speculated Brooks wanted to cross over into the rock/pop space. Gaines was a vehicle for that. He wanted to experiment without facing the ire of country music fans. But as Deusner points out, Brooks was always at odds with country music. Deusner shows how Brooks went against the country music tropes. Rather than presenting himself as down-to-earth and relatable, he was a larger-than-life figure who was more like a rock star than a cowboy. You didn’t see Tim McGraw flying across stadiums to sing to folks in the nosebleeds. Brooks also made songs about discrimination and domestic abuse. He was an ally for gay rights before it was widely accepted, which was taboo in the country scene. He even once described his music as “Geroge Straight meets late Seventies rock.”  Because of this, critics constantly questioned his authenticity. Though Brooks wanted to do things his way, he didn’t want to completely alienate his audience. The only way he could move outside of country music was to create a different version of Garth Brooks. The result? Chris Gaines.

Garth Brooks In…The Life of Chris Gaines is a compelling examination of the weirdest chapter in Brooks’ career. It’s less of a retrospective and more of Deusner’s attempt at figuring out who the real Garth Brooks is. Is he the superstar we see on stage in the Stetson hat and garish shirts? Is it the guy who hates heights and daydreams that Brooks mentions in interviews? Or is it this Gaines fellow who’s soft-spoken, has a tragic backstory, and likes to rock out? The way Deusner sees it, it’s a combination of the three. Though his arguments are intriguing, how they are presented is confusing. If you don’t quickly pick up what Deusner is going for, you’ll be turned off by the book. But if you stick with it, you’ll walk away with a better understanding of who Brooks/Gaines is.

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