“Mammas Don’t Let Your Babies Grow Up to Be Cowboys” wasn’t supposed to be taken so literally… we shouldn’t even have to have that conversation.
Willie Nelson and Waylon Jennings recorded their #1 hit “Mammas Don’t Let Your Babies Grow Up to Be Cowboys” in 1978, which was originally written and recorded by Ed Bruce, along with his wife Patsy Bruce. The song was featured on his 1976 self-titled album, and Chris LeDoux also covered it for his 1976 album, Songbook of the American West.
Of course, it was made extremely popular by Waylon and Willie, when they covered it for their 1978 duets album Waylon & Willie. It became an instant classic, peaking at #1 on the U.S. Billboard Hot Country Songs chart later that same year, in addition to reaching the #42 spot on the U.S. Billboard Hot 100 chart. The pair won a Grammy award for the duet in 1979 for Best Country Performance by a Duo or Group with Vocal.
It’s a country classic, about how many bad boy cowboys are roaming around, and there’s nothing wrong with that if you ask me…
But it seems like they’re a dying breed, so to speak, at least the kind Willie and Waylon sang about in the 70’s, and country artist Tami Neilson has something to say about it.
She just released a new song called “Too Many Mamas” which features the legendary Willie Nelson, and
The song playfully challenges Willie and Waylon Jennings’ classic 1978 hit “Mamas, Don’t Let Your Babies Grow Up to Be Cowboys,” asking why so many mamas listened back then—leaving a shortage of cowboys today.
The two previously worked together a 2022 duet called “Beyond the Stars,” but this new one is so much more fun and a really neat take on a country classic:
“Tami has a bone to pick with Willie Nelson: Too many mamas listened to Willie when he and Waylon sang ‘Mamas, Don’t Let Your Babies Grow Up to be Cowboys’ back in ‘78, and now there isn’t a cowboy to be found from here to the city!
Turns out, the ol’ Red Headed Stranger has a confession to make: he and Waylon just wanted to keep all the pretty women to themselves. So now what’s a girl to do?!”
The song was recorded at Pedernales Studios in Texas, and was written by Tami Neilson along with Kate Wilson and Sarah Lentini:
The lyrics find Tami wondering why all the Mamas actually listened to Willie and Waylon when it came to raising up their boys, because now there aren’t enough cowboys left for the girls today. She jokes about being conceived at one of Willie’s iconic 4th of July picnics after “smoking that good green,” a cheeky nod to one of the Red Headed Stranger’s most famous hobbies:
“Too many Mamas listen to Willie
Now what’s a girl to do
When there ain’t no more cowboys form here to the city
‘Cause too many Mamas listened to Willie
My Mama made me after smoking that good green
At a picnic in Texas on July the 4th
Where Waylon and Willie told everybody not to raise cowboys no more
But I grew up dreaming of some cowboy sweeping me off my feet into the sun
And I heard you say they might just ride away
But the nights that they don’t sure as hell are more fun”
Willie comes on, admitting that they released that song because he wanted all the pretty girls to himself and “got a bid greedy”:
“If I get to Heaven, I’ll make my confession
I’ll tell the good Lord it just couldn’t be helped
He made girls too pretty, I got a bit greedy
Can’t blame me for trying to keep them to myself”
The song closes with Tami saying that, decades later, it’s left us girls with no “Lonestar lovers” and wanted call the country outlaws out for what they did:
“No Stetsons or Wranglers or boots,
Now they’re endangered,
Hey Red Headed Stranger,
I don’t think you thought it all through
No Lonestar lovers, it sure is a pity,
Cause too many Mamas listened to Willie”
Amen to that…
It’s hard to make songs like this work when they’re a take-off on a country classic, but they lyrics are solid and really funny, the concept is pretty unique, and with Willie being featured, it’s hard not to call it a winner.
And I think Tami makes a great point, which Willie needed to answer for… check it out:
“Too Many Mamas”
“Mammas Don’t Let Your Babies Grow Up to Be Cowboys”
