At this point, everyone has surely heard Morgan Wallen’s 9x platinum hit, “Whiskey Glasses.” Released on July 30, 2018, the track was only Wallen’s third-ever single and would eventually be his first #1 hit on Billboard’s Hot Country Songs chart.
Til this day, it remains one of his most popular songs, amassing over 817 million streams on Spotify (which is good for 10th all time in the genre). And though Wallen popularized the track, it was originally written by Ben Burgess and Kevin Kadish.
In honor of the song going #1 on country radio five years ago today, Burgess decided to release the demo version on streaming services. Though some demos sound radically different than the official studio release in some cases, Burgess’ “Whiskey Glasses” isn’t too dissimilar to Wallen’s crowd pleaser.
Although Burgess’ version features a more prominent banjo in the chorus, the demo shows that Wallen and Co. didn’t change up much structurally besides adding an electric guitar and a bit stronger percussion throughout. In an interview with WBWN, a radio station in Bloomington, Illinois, Wallen said, “I wanted to make the song kind of feel more drunk as it went along. We kept adding little things here and there to make it almost wobble.”
Listening to both versions back to back, you can definitely hear Wallen’s sentiment. The 31 year-old’s take captures a looser vibe compared to Burgess’. Regardless, you can’t really go wrong with either.
Listen to both versions here: