Cooper Alan helped write a song called “Dale Dickens (RIP),” and he has confirmed that Dale is a fictional character, Cowgirl Magazine reports.
“He’s fictitious!” Alan said in a 2025 interview with Entertainment Focus.
He joked that there was nobody like Dale where he grew up in Winston-Salem, North Carolina. The song is drawing comparisons to “Goodbye Earl,” the Dixie Chicks hit.
The song follows Katie, a small-town woman trapped in a toxic relationship with Dale. The official credits list Alan, Jake Rose and Sam Bergeson as its writers, and it was released as part of a growing catalog from an independent artist with more than 750 million streams.
“Goodbye Earl” is the 2000 country anthem written by Dennis Linde, the same songwriter behind Elvis Presley’s “Burning Love.” The Dixie Chicks, who have performed as The Chicks since 2020, recorded it for Fly, their 1999 album that went diamond. It tells the story of two best friends, Wanda and Mary Ann, and the abusive husband who does not survive the song, and some radio stations balked at playing it.
That is the company “Dale Dickens (RIP)” keeps. One songwriter gave country music Earl, and three of them gave it Dale.
Winston-Salem Is the Hometown Cooper Alan Says Never Had a Dale
Alan spent six years building a fanbase and a catalog before his debut album arrived, and he named it Winston-Salem, after his hometown. It opens with “Roots,” which he calls a “good old driving American country-rock song,” and one line in it could stand for every small town in country music.
“There’s some planted down in the dirt of every hometown,” he sings.
For You
In the bio on his website, he said he wanted to put every bit of himself on that record without fear, hoping to relate to everyone who finds the songs.
“I hope everyone sees this album is 100 percent me,” he said.
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The crowds have followed him far from North Carolina. He has sold over 150,000 tickets, sold out a headline tour of Australia at the end of 2024 and sold out 20 shows on his To The Bar Tour in spring 2025.
Katie’s small town has a Dale, and the hometown Alan grew up in, by his telling, never did. The title of “Dale Dickens (RIP)” carries its farewell in parentheses, the same way “Goodbye Earl” put its farewell in its name in 2000.
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