Songfacts®:

• Named by CMT as one of the 100 greatest country songs of all-time, this was the result of a night-long songwriting binge by Country music songwriters Hank Cochran and Dean Dillon. The two had been writing songs all night long and as Dillon puts it "were about written out" when he strummed his guitar and sang the line "Excuse me but I think you've got my chair." Twenty minutes later, "The Chair" was complete.
• This is one of Strait's 51 #1 hits, a record for country music. >>

  Suggestion credit:
  Julian - Oakland, AR
• Cochran was already a seasoned veteran in the music industry with classic songs like Patsy Cline's "I Fall To Pieces" to his name, and acted as a mentor to Dean Dillon, who was making his own mark in the business penning hits for Strait and other country artists.
  
  Dillon spoke with us in 2012 about collaborating with Cochran on the track: "There's some lines in that song which are just brilliant that Hank wrote. The line, 'Thank you, can I drink you a buy, well, listen to me, what I meant is can I buy you a drink, anything you please,' it just shows how flustered the guy was. He's tripping over himself to get to know this girl. And using every line in the book, basically, to get her attention. And I just thought that was really brilliant on Hank's part. But then you have to understand Hank Cochran was one of the most brilliant songwriters ever in country music."