How Morgan Wallen and Chris Stapleton Created One of the Most Underrated Songs on ‘Dangerous’: ‘Only Thing That's Gone’

Five years on, Morgan Wallen's Dangerous: The Double Album continues to age like fine wine - or, more accurately for the subject matter, like a heady, port-cask whiskey.

Released on January 8th, 2021, Dangerous cemented Wallen's status as country music's preeminent star, following the immense success of lead singles such as ‘More Than My Hometown’, ‘7 Summers’, ‘Heartless’ and ’Cover Me Up’.

In the five years since its release, Dangerous has been certified nine-times Platinum, with a Diamond certification imminent, and the project has spent an monumental 260 weeks (and counting) on the Billboard 200. After tallying ten straight frames at No. 1 on its release, Dangerous has become a fixture at the business-end of the all-genre chart, being crowned the Top Album of the 21st Century by Billboard.

It's incredible to think that even now, exactly five years on, Dangerous sits at No. 18 on the listing, ahead of recent behemoths such as Taylor Swift's The Tortured Poets Department, Kendrick Lamar's GNX and Tyler, The Creator's CHROMAKOPIA.

As a result of its groundbreaking popularity, Dangerous instigated a serious shift in the country music landscape, with labels and artists taking note of Wallen's novel strategy. At the time, projects with 30-plus songs were unheard of - now, they're commonplace, with numerous artists utilising longer tracklists in an attempt to flood streaming platforms and boost their numbers. Similarly, Dangerous was one of the first country albums to heavily incorporate TikTok teasing to enhance hype; ‘7 Summers’ was the first major country hit to go viral on the platform.

Dangerous has produced such a wealth of now-iconic hits and fan-favourites, that many forget there's a blockbuster guest nestled in the midst of Side A from Chris Stapleton.

On any other album, a Stapleton feature would most likely be the main talking-point during the pre-release press, and would probably end up being the most buzzed-about song on the album. But on Dangerous, Wallen and Stapleton's ‘Only Thing That's Gone’ is a mere album track, a deep cut, but nonetheless a stellar, evocative song that has held a special place in fans’ hearts over the past five years.

Given Wallen's still-contentious standing in various pockets of Nashville, following the controversies that ensured around the release of Dangerous, it's now quite uncommon to see him collaborating with a mainstream country artist outside of his close network of buddies - i.e. Eric Church, ERNEST, HARDY and Post Malone. There's the occasional cross-genre bolt-from-the-blue, such as ‘What I Want’ with Tate McRae and his rumoured Drake link-up, but generally, as Wallen's status has grown, he hasn't felt the need to lean on collaborations too heavily at all.

Which makes his joint track with Stapleton feel even rarer and more precious. Their voices sound electric together, with Stapleton's gravelly, husky vocals combining with Wallen's raw, heartfelt drawl as they trade verses about a lover who's long departed. You can picture them on a lonely stool, looking desperately at the bartender as they confide, “Buddy, my last drink / Ain't the only thing that's gone”.

In a conversation with Katie & Company around the album's release, Wallen revealed how Stapleton ended up on the track. He explained that the Kentucky native had already expressed an interest in being a part of the project, with Wallen then sending him a range of options for a potential collaboration. Stapleton chose ‘Only Thing That's Gone’, with Wallen championing his part as being “incredible”.

In the interview, the ‘Whiskey Glasses’ hitmaker admits he was a tad apprehensive about the prospect of going head-to-head with such a revered vocalist on the same tracak, “Yeah, I mean, there might have been a little bit of nerves about [singing with Stapleton]”, before recalling, “But, I gave him a couple of songs to choose from, if he wanted to sing at all...He said he was interested in being part of the project. So we sent him a few songs that we felt would fit him”.

Wallen reveals that he and his creative team gave Stapleton the flexibility to put his stamp on his part of ‘Only Thing That's Gone’, “He chose that one and we kind of just said, ‘Hey, you have freedom to do whatever you want’. And what he sent back was incredible, and it seemed like our voices blended well. I'm honoured to have him on here - I'm a huge fan, so I'm glad. I think we sound good together”.

We couldn't agree more, and despite the fact that a dwindling portion of the Nashville scene - most notably the awards circuit - continue to shun Wallen in light of his past controversies, we'd love to see him joining forces with more of his contemporaries.

A duet with Luke Combs, for instance, would be a truly seismic moment for country music, with Wallen and Combs being two of the biggest names in the genre for the best part of ten years. Similarly, now that Wallen has finally released a female duet with McRae, we'd be keen to see more in this vein from the ‘Last Night’ chart-topper, perhaps in the form of a joint track with Lainey Wilson or Ella Langley.

Either way, ‘Only Thing That's Gone’ is a fascinating and in many ways crucial moment frozen in time. When it was recorded, it was a fast-emerging boy from East Tennessee teaming up with one of the biggest names in country music. Now, listening back, the dynamic is completely different, with Wallen the most popular artist in the genre by a mile, surpassing Stapleton in terms of streams and ticket sales.

It's not a competition, of course, but it nonetheless makes ‘Only Thing That's Gone’ an interesting snapshot into Wallen's trajectory. While he makes it clear he loves the song, Stapleton has been a little more blasé when asked about the duet in the past.

When chatting to Taste of Country Nights, for instance, Stapleton shared that they'd never really hung out together, “I got an email...I’ve only met [Wallen] in passing, at some awards shows and things, but we’ve never really stood in a room together”.

Stapleton went on to express how he enjoyed one of the demos Wallen sent him, “One of them I liked pretty good, so I said, ‘Hey, let’s try it out’. It was kind of my first venture back into doing anything [after putting out [Starting Over], but my engineer that I normally work with, Vance Powell, they sent him the track and I went and sang on it”, with the ‘White Horse’ singer-songwriter concluding with a somewhat blunt and dismissive summary, “Now it is something that exists”.

Well, we're sure glad it does exist, as this powerful ode - which was written by Wallen alongside a trio of reliable songsmiths, Matt Dragstrem, Chase McGill and Josh Thompson - remains one of our favourites from Dangerous. On the five-year anniversary of this game-changing record, while the likes of ‘7 Summers’ and ‘More Than My Hometown’ will naturally remain the most widely beloved odes from the project, album tracks like ‘Only Thing That's Gone’, ‘Silverado for Sale’ and ’Livin’ the Dream’ will continue to be celebrated by Wallen's core fanbase as radiant examples of why he is the modern King of Country Music.

Featured photo by Spidey Smith

For more on Morgan Wallen, see below: