it pissed me off. And I thought, 'You sons of bitches, you've never been restricted away from this great, wonderful country, and yet here you are in the streets bitchin' about things, protesting about a war that they didn't know anymore about than I did. They weren't over there fightin' that war anymore than I was." Haggard began performing the song in concert in the fall of 1969 and was astounded at the reaction it received. As David Cantwell notes in his 2013 book Merle Haggard: The Running Kind, "The Haggard camp knew they were on to something. Everywhere they went, every show, "Okie" did more than prompt enthusiastic applause. There was an unanticipated adulation racing through the crowds now, standing ovations that went on and on and sometimes left the audience and the band-members alike teary-eyed. Merle had somehow stumbled upon a song that expressed previously inchoate fears, spoke out loud gripes and anxieties otherwise only whispered, and now people were using his song, were using him, to connect themselves to these larger concerns and to one another." The studio version topped the charts in the fall of 1969, where it remained for a month, and also hit number 41 on the pop charts, becoming Haggard's all-time biggest hit (until his 1973 crossover Christmas smash "If We Make It Through December") and signature tune. In Haggard's episode of CMT's Inside Fame, Brian Mansfield of USA Today insists, "I think between 1966 and 1969/1970, when he's doing "Okie from Muskogee" and "Fightin' Side of Me," that period was every bit the match of Hank Williams from about 1950 to 1952. I think it's that good..." Critical reception The album topped the Billboard country albums chart and hit number 46 on pop chart and won the Academy of Country Music award for Album of the Year in 1969. It also received the CMA Award for Album of the Year in 1970. Haggard also won Single of the Year for "Okie from Muskogee" as well as Top Male Vocalist. Stephen Thomas Erlewine of AllMusic wrote, "While the record isn't necessary, it is a hell of a lot of fun and not bad evidence of why Hag was the most popular figure in country music at the end of the '60s." Music critic Robert Christgau wrote "Despite some slack performances, this album.. is a passable sampler.... But The Best of Merle Haggard is