Smoky Mountain Rain

Smoky Mountain Rain is a country song recorded by Ronnie Milsap, released in September 1980 as the only new single from his Greatest Hits album. It would make #1 on the country charts (his 16th) and also on the pop charts (the first of his two songs to do so), and in 2010 would be named the eighth official "state song" of Tennessee.

Sung in first person, it tells of someone returning to Knoxville from Los Angeles, realizing "those bright lights ain't where I belong". He calls his lover from a rain-soaked phone booth, only to learn she has moved on. Desperate to restore the relationship, he manages to get a ride with a truck driver heading to Gatlinburg (which, being further east than Knoxville, will allow him to get there without changing rides), hoping to find her.