The Relisten: Roger Creager - Having Fun All Wrong

In the late ‘90s, the Texas Music scene felt less like an industry and more like a rolling tailgate party with amplifiers. The stages were smaller, the crowds were rowdier, and every college town from San Marcos to Lubbock had somebody swearing they’d just seen the next big thing at a dancehall on a Thursday night.

Into that world walked Roger Creager with 1998’s Having Fun All Wrong.

Another Lloyd Maines production that treaded similar ground to Pat and Cory sonically while allowing Roger to plant a flag all his own.

The album wasn’t polished Nashville country. It wasn’t trying to be. This was the sound of the Texas scene figuring out its own identity in real time. Equal parts Gulf Coast swagger, Aggie tailgate, dancehall country and Jimmy Buffett escapism.

The opening stretch alone tells you everything you need to know. “I Can Too” and “Moving On” establish Creager’s easygoing charisma immediately, but it’s “The Everclear Song” that became the stuff of legend. The song turned into a rite of passage for an entire generation of Texas music fans and remains one of the defining singalongs of the Red Dirt/Texas country boom from the turn of the cen

Ahh, "The Everclear Song".

Revisiting “The Everclear Song” in 2026 is one of those moments where you realize how much the world, and the listener, has changed since 1998.

Back then, it just registered as another wild Texas party song. Loud and dumb. A little dangerous. The kind of thing people yelled arm in arm at dancehalls without thinking too deeply about it.

Things that once got chalked up as reckless college storytelling can sound different to modern ears. Still, it’s important to remember the spirit the song came from. Creager’s music was never mean spirited. The whole Having Fun All Wrong era captured a real slice of late-‘90s Texas life: messy nights, bad ideas, river trips, heartbreak, hangovers and all. The songs felt more like stories told from the middle of the chaos than lessons endorsing it.

And honestly, that’s probably why people still connect with this record all these years later. It feels human. Imperfect, adventurous and young.

Relistening serves as a snapshot of a specific time, place and culture in Texas Music history.

And here’s the thing revisiting this record in 2026…

A lot of Texas country albums from that era feel trapped in amber. Having Fun All Wrong somehow doesn’t.

Part of that is Roger Creager himself. He never sounded like he was chasing trends. He sounded like a guy inviting you into whatever chaos was happening that weekend. There’s a looseness to the album that gives it staying power. Nothing feels overthought. The songs breathe. The band swings. The whole thing feels lived in.

The title track still hits because underneath the humor is a little melancholy. This is a recurring theme in the best Texas country records. The party is incredible…until it isn’t. The freedom is intoxicating…until the consequences arrive. That tension has always been where Creager shines best.

There are also flashes throughout the album of where the Texas scene was headed. You can hear the independent spirit that became the blueprint for countless artists who realized they didn’t need Nashville’s permission anymore.

By the time I Got the Guns arrived a couple years later, Creager was already a major force. But Having Fun All Wrong is the snapshot of the moment right before liftoff...when the bars were packed, the miles were endless and the Texas Music revolution still felt like a secret you discovered from a buddy handing you a burned CD.

That’s why this album still matters. It captures a scene before it became a business.

And maybe more importantly…before everybody started taking themselves so seriously.

You can still throw this record on driving toward the coast with the windows down and suddenly feel 22 again.

That’s timeless.