The Best Day (song)

The song is told through the eyes of a father who recalls his son describing key events of his life as being "the best day of [his] life," since they were particularly memorable and had pleasant memories attached to them. As the song progresses, the son grows from childhood into adolescence and eventually adulthood.

The first verse recalls a father-son campout, and the young boy looking forward to a weekend of fishing, conversation and bonding, and other camping-related activities with his father.

The second verse shows a boy from the first verse who now becomes a teenager and newly licensed with his father and he gets his first car, a classic Chevrolet Corvette which he and his father plan to restore.

The third and final verse is set on the son's wedding day. As they stand in a rear room of the church, the son after vowing to take what he learned in childhood from his parents and applying it to his new marriage repeats a line he has at the previous two points of his life: "I'm the luckiest man alive, this is the best day of my life" — in this final verse, replacing "boy" with "man."

The song is in the key of A major with a 4/4 time signature and a slow tempo of about 66 beats per minute. Its intro uses the pattern A-Aaug-D-E7, and the verses use a pattern of A-D-E-A.[1]

Larry Flick, of Billboard magazine reviewed the song favorably, calling it a "well-written tale that listeners will find easily relatable, and the chorus makes this the ultimate feel-good tune to kick off the millennium." He goes on to say that Strait's "warm-throated delivery is all honest emotion."[2]

The song entered the Hot Country Singles & Tracks chart at number 48 on the chart dated January 1, 2000, and spent 29 weeks on the chart. The song also climbed to number 1 after spending 17 weeks on the chart, where it held number 1 for three weeks on the chart dated April 22, 2000. In addition, this song became Strait's 36th Billboard Number One as a solo artist.