Tim McGraw photo courtesy of Curb Nashville.

When Gregg Allman showed up Tuesday with Tim McGraw on “The Jay Leno Show,” it was a bit of an event, though maybe not quite as unusual an event as it would have been in years gone by.

Gregg was an appropriate musical partner — after all, Tim’s current single “Southern Voice,” which he performed on “Leno,” namechecks the Allman Brothers along with Tom Petty and Chuck Berry.

But Gregg’s hardly the only pop star or rocker with an attachment to country these days. The Zac Brown Band’s “Toes” is co-written with singer-songwriter Shawn Mullins, who referred to Los Angeles as “Nashville with a tan” in his 1998 pop hit “Lullaby.” Carrie Underwood’s “Cowboy Casanova” counts Mike Elizondo, who’s worked with Maroon 5 and Snoop Dogg, among its writers. Brooks & Dunn’s “Honky Tonk Stomp” gets a signature vocal stamp from ZZ Top’s Billy Gibbons. Jimmy Wayne enlisted Daryl Hall & John Oates to back him on his remake of “Sara Smile.” And Darius Rucker came to country music after first establishing himself in Hootie + The Blowfish.

Then there’s Kenny Chesney, who brought Dave Matthews in to sing on his current Top 10 hit “I’m Alive.”

“It was a good message for me, to me, about priorities,” Kenny says of the song. “You know, remembering what matters, keeping perspective, trying not to get so lost in running after whatever, that you forget what it is you’re chasing. And that’s really reinforced for me by having my friend Dave Matthews on this record. He’s someone I respect and I never get enough time to visit with, and that’s not the way we all oughta live. Every time I hear his voice, I smile and remember.”

That’s not where the pop influences end. Canadian rock band Nickelback got covered in Bucky Covington’s latest single, a remake of “Gotta Be Somebody.”

“When my producer came to me with this I said, ‘I’m not really sure about that idea.’” Bucky told BlogCritics.com. “Trying to put a banjo and a fiddle on a Nickelback song to a lot of people sounds unheard of. But we did do it, and it’s an amazing song. I’m very fortunate to have done the song, and I just love it to death.”

And Nickelback brings it all back to Tim McGraw, whose previous single, “It’s A Business Doing Pleasure With You,” was written by Nickelback vocalist Chad Kroeger and producer Joey Moi.

For the record, Tim was not the first to jump on the Allman bandwagon. Willie Nelson recorded Gregg’s “Midnight Rider” for the soundtrack to The Electric Horseman way back in 1980. And the Allmans’ “Ramblin’ Man” was mentioned in the lyrics of a couple of recent hits: the Eli Young Band’s “Always The Love Songs” and Brad Paisley’s duet with Keith Urban, “Start A Band.”

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Tim McGraw photo by Danny Clinch, courtesy of Curb Records.

Tim McGraw releases his new Southern Voice album Tuesday, and in gearing up for the street date, he’ll appear this weekend with host Nan Kelley on GAC’s Top 20 Country Countdown.

The album’s first single, “It’s A Business Doing Pleasure With You,” was written in part by Chad Kroeger of the rock band Nickelback, and his current hit, “Southern Voice,” namechecks such rockers as Chuck Berry, Tom Petty, Jerry Lee Lewis and the Allman Brothers. In fact, Gregg Allman will sit in with Tim when he performs “Southern Voice” on “The Jay Leno Show” Oct. 27.

Tim has more than just an album and TV appearances up his sleeve. His next movie, The Blind Side, reaches theaters Nov. 20, and he kicks off his Southern Voice Tour Feb. 11 in Omaha. Lady Antebellum will open the entire run, which stretches through Aug. 15 in Virginia Beach. The Lost Trailers will take the lineup’s third slot through April 10. Beginning the following day, Love And Theft will take over that role and keep it the rest of the way.

Top 20 Country Countdown counts down the week’s top country videos from No. 20 to No. 1 as voted by viewers on each week on GACTV.com. A new countdown premieres every Friday at 8 p.m. ET on GAC and airs again Saturdays at 10 a.m. and 5:30 p.m. ET; Sundays at 1 p.m. ET; and Mondays at 10 a.m. ET. Viewers can vote for their favorite videos, as well as purchase Top 20 artists’ albums and ringtones at GACTV.com.

Click here to preview each song on our Top 20 list and download the ones you want!

THIS WEEK’S CHART:

1. Kellie Pickler “Didn’t You Know How Much I Loved You”
2. Lady Antebellum “Need You Now”
3. Luke Bryan “Do I”
4. Keith Urban “Only You Can Love Me This Way”
5. Chris Young “Gettin’ You Home”
6. Trace Adkins “All I Ask For Anymore”
7. George Strait “Living For The Night”
8. Billy Currington “People Are Crazy”
9. Toby Keith “American Ride”
10. Martina McBride “I Just Call You Mine”
11. Josh Turner “Why Don’t We Just Dance”
12. Jason Aldean “Big Green Tractor”
13. Jason Michael Carroll “Hurry Home”
14. Jake Owen “Eight Second Ride”
15. Brad Paisley “Welcome To The Future”
16. Alan Jackson “I Still Like Bologna”
17. Dierks Bentley “I Wanna Make You Close Your Eyes”
18. Due West “I Get That All The Time”
19. Zac Brown Band “Toes”
20. Brooks & Dunn “Honky Tonk Stomp”

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