TULSA, OK (CelebrityAccess) – Country music singer/songwriter Darryl Worley is set to hit Track 5 at the Hard Rock Hotel & Casino in Tulsa for a free show on Thursday (August 31) at 8 pm local time.
Worley’s all-American hit songs like “I Miss My Friend,” “When You Need My Love,” “A Good Day To Run,” “Second Wind,” and “Awful, Beautiful Life” are nostalgic-inducing stories of appreciation for the blue-collar way of life and speaks to the human condition. “I Miss My Friend” brought Worley his first No. 1 single.
Now, after a nearly 8-year hiatus, Worley is back on the scene with a laser-like focus on his career and family, inspired by the birth of his daughter Savannah in 2008. “I needed to take some time to figure out what being a daddy meant, and it meant a whole lot more than what I thought,” Worley wrote on his official website.
“A buddy of mine said something to me that was like a God-send at that time,” Worley notes. “He said, ‘You know, people in this business do make comebacks.’ I agreed, and he said, ‘Well, you’ve got to go away before you can come back.’”
Worley embarked on a USO tour to Kuwait and Afghanistan during the holiday season of 2002, and he was inspired by the dedication and sacrifice of those who put their lives on the line for their beliefs. Since then, Worley has gone on more than 150 USO tours, sometimes in the financial deficit, to show his appreciation to his fellow patriots.
The result of that initial USO tour was Worley’s best-known song, the powerful post-9/11 anthem, “Have You Forgotten?” which followed the biggest terrorist attack ever on US soil. The song, co-written by Wynn Varble, was released two years after the terrorist attacks and was an eye-opening reminder not to forget the day airplanes were highjacked and purposefully flown into New York’s Twin Towers and the Pentagon.
Five weeks after its release, the song spent seven weeks in the No. 1 spot on the Billboard Hot Country Songs chart and peaked at No. 22 on the Billboard Hot 100.
Twenty years after Worley released “Have You Forgotten?” in June of this year, he rereleased it with a reimagined title and revamped lyrics called “Have We Forgotten?” A sample of the updated lyrics can be seen below.
“I hear people saying our best days are gone / A people once united can’t even get along / A nation so divided, a country torn in two / It’s such a shame after all we’ve been through.
“We’ve always been a beacon, the world’s one shining light / Are we gonna let it all go wrong for the sake of being right?
“Have we forgotten who we really are? / All the storms we’ve had to weather and how we ever got this far / Have we forgotten how it used to be / When we could still sit down together and agree to disagree / And the common good was what we had in common /Have we forgotten? ”
The Southern TN native, raised by a Methodist minister father and a church-choir mom, is known for his realistic relatable lyrics and love for country and the military – has ushered in a new era with his latest album, Second Wind: Latest and Greatest.
The rhythmic and Caribbean-inspired new songs “It’s Good To Be Me,” “Lay It On Me’ and “Lonely Alone” combines classic hits with current tracks – cementing Worley into today’s modern country culture.
The free show at Hard Rock Hotel & Casino Tulsa is the flagship property of Cherokee Nation Entertainment. For information on upcoming shows at Track 5 inside Hard Rock Live, visit http://www.hardrockcasinotulsa.com/ or call 918-384-ROCK.
In addition to the free show, Worley will also make an appearance at the God and Country Music Festival in Westmoreland, TN, on September 23. The festival will feature an air show and tribute to the military.
