Buck Owens – Out There Chasing Rainbows

“Out There Chasing Rainbows” sits in Buck Owens’s catalog like a small, weathered postcard — the kind of song that looks simple at first glance but keeps revealing little details the more you think about it. It’s the sort of number you can imagine slipping into a setlist late in the night, when the dancing slows and people start listening because the words feel like something a friend might say over the counter. Buck had a knack for choosing songs that sounded like real life, and this one reads as an admission from someone who has followed promises too long and is learning to live with the fallout.

Those who knew the Bakersfield scene talk about how songs like this grew out of real places and small conversations. Buck wasn’t a magpie for gossip, but he was an excellent listener; bandmates and road crew tell stories about him lingering in clubs after a gig, folding a phrase into his pocket and later turning it into a line you could sing back. “Out There Chasing Rainbows” carries that pedigree — it feels borrowed from the sidewalks and the parking lots where people trade regrets and half-jokes, and Buck trusted that authenticity more than any studio polish.

Recording sessions from the era were often brisk affairs, and the Buckaroos had learned to catch the feeling before it slipped away. There’s lore among listeners that the band favored first or second takes when the performance felt honest; the tiny creaks and breaths made a track feel human rather than crafted. That approach suits this song well. It doesn’t demand ornamentation; it asks for clarity and a voice that sounds like it’s telling the truth about chasing something beautiful that keeps moving just out of reach.

Onstage the song worked as a quiet counterpoint to Owens’s boisterous numbers. When played live, it tended to shrink the room: conversation dropped, cigarettes burned a little lower, and people seemed to listen as if someone had paused to tell them a private story. Fans who remember those sets say the effect wasn’t dramatized; it was the subtle authority of a singer who’d seen enough of the road to know when a life lesson needed to be offered gently rather than shouted.

Another small thread in the song’s life is how it connected with listeners who had grown tired of spectacle. In towns where Buck played regularly, audiences often brought the weight of work and family with them. A song about chasing rainbows — beautiful, elusive, and perhaps foolish — resonated because it acknowledged that yearning without shaming it. It wasn’t moralizing; it was companionship for people who understood the persistent itch to go after something brighter.

Today the track sits among Owens’s deeper cuts, the kind die-hard fans trade recommendations about late at night. It doesn’t demand chart placement or radio play to be meaningful; it just needs ears that want to hear honesty. That quiet endurance is typical of Buck’s best work: he didn’t need to shout to be heard. He trusted a good line and a steady delivery, and “Out There Chasing Rainbows” is one of those songs that rewards anyone willing to listen close.