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The Story Behind the Song
... Page Five
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According to record
producer Jerry Kennedy, Dave Dudley's 1965 hit "Truck Drivin' Son of A
Gun" was not recorded for a single record. Jerry Kennedy commented,
"Dave Dudley's hit song "Truck Drivin' Son of A Gun" was brought to me by
Dixie Dean, Tom T. Hall's wife -- that was before they were married.
She wrote that song with Ray King and she brought it into the office.
She brought that song in just before we did the album. In fact that
song was recorded for an album. It was not intended to be a single
record. It just happened to become a single. Jimmy Key was
Dave Dudley's manager at the time and he did a lot of the legwork as far
as finding a lot of Dudley's songs to record.
Dave Dudley's "Truck
Drivin' Son of A Gun" made the country charts July 10th, 1965 and became
his 8th charted song. It peaked at #3 and hung there for three
weeks. It was on the charts for 21 weeks.
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Dave Dudley was born David Pedruska in
Spencer, Wisconsin in 1928. He placed 41 songs on the country
charts between 1961 and 1980. He died in 2003 at the age of 75
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Sometimes a song covers a lot
of time and territory before getting recorded and according to
Jim Weatherly, Glen Campbell's 1984 hit, "A Lady Like You" was
just such a song.
Writer Jim Weatherly commented, "At the time I wrote that
song, I was staying in Franklin, Tennessee with a friend of
mine. And my girl friend at the time -- who is now my
wife -- she and I were driving into Nashville from Franklin
that day and she was just kind of talking about her
grandparents. And she just had this kind of wistful
quality about her ... a very ladylike kind of quality.
And I was just watching her as she talked. And the idea
"A Lady Like You" just came into my mind. I didn't have
any kind of melody for it and later I got together with Keith
Stegall and I asked him what he thought of the idea, "A Lady
Like You", and he said he liked the idea and he started
playing a little melody on the piano. And he came up
with the first two lines, "Here I am just an ordinary man,"
and I came up with "my virtues are few," and the rest of the
song just came to us. It just fell right into place.
It didn't take us very long to write the song, but it did take
us a while to get it recorded. We had thought it would
be a great song for Glen Campbell and we sent it to Glen four
or five different ways, through different people. And we got
no response at all. So Glen was in Nashville recording
and a friend of mine, Marty Gamblin, was running Glen's
publishing company. And his office was in the same
building where glen was recording. And Glen's wife was
there. Marty played "A Lady Like You" for Glen's wife
and she asked if Glen had heard the song. And we didn't
know if he had heard it or not although we had sent it to him.
So she asked for a copy of the song, we gave it to her and she
walked in the studio and handed the song to Glen and told him
he needed to listen to it. They were about to
record the last song for an album and Glen did listen to the
song then and there. He liked it and decided to record
it right then for the album. So they spent a few minutes
working out the arrangement and they recorded it in one take.
So the song did get on the album, and a few months later I ran
into Glen and he told me that I had the next single, "A Lady
Like You." And the whole thing just floored me, because
we had sent him the song so many times and it took getting it
played by his wife to get him to record it.
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And a little funny story
about that recording: Glen usually sings with a mint
in his mouth. I guess it keeps his mouth from
getting dry -- or something -- I don't really know.
And the line in the song, "And it's a mystery how someone
like me," now right there I guess the mint got in the
wrong place because Glen says "ristery" instead of
"mystery." And if you don't know it you really can't
tell it but it's there. But if you listen real close
to that one line, you can hear "ristery" instead of
"mystery.""A
Lady Like You" made the country charts December 1st, 1984
and peaked at #4. It was Campbell's 60th charted
song, and was on the charts for 20 weeks. |
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The need for
money has prompted the writing of many songs, and according to
Buddy Killen, Jim Reeves hit song "Home" was one of those tunes
Buddy
commented, "Roger Miller was always needing money and he came into
my office one day and told me that he had to have three hundred
dollars. I told him I'd already given him more money than
the company was worth and I just couldn't give him any more.
I told him that he hadn't written me a song in six months, I just
can't give you any more money. And he told me that he just
wasn't in the mood to write songs right then. So I told him
that I could not get him any more money unless he wrote me a song.
So just go in the other office and see what you can come up with.
So he went in the other little office and about 15 minutes later
he comes out with a song. And the song was "Home." So
I told Roger that I would give him the three hundred dollars, but
before I did he would have to tell me why he had to have the
money. And he told me that he had just seen this fantastic
riding lawn mower that cost three hundred dollars and he just had
to have it. So I gave him the three hundred dollars.
He bought the riding lawn mower and drove it eight miles down the
highway and used it one time to mow his yard and that was the end
of it. And I actually got the song recorded by Jim Reeves
that same week and it became a big record for Jim.
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Roger Miller |
Jim Reeves |
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Eddy Raven |
"Home" made
the country charts for Jim Reeves March 30th, 1959 and was his
23rd charted song. It peaked at #2 and was on the charts for
20 weeks.
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Richard Leigh
commented, "I wrote "Life's Highway" with Roger Murrah and I believe that
was his title. He and I used to write quite a bit together and he
brought that title over one day. And when he told me about it, I
just thought it was a great idea for a song and we just took it from
there. There's no big story behind the song. It's sort of a
spiritual thing ... you know ... he and I are both religious people and we
just thought that that idea needed to be talked about a little more and so
we just tried to put the idea into that song."
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Steve Warner |
Steve Warner |
"Life's Highway" made
the country charts March 15th for Steve Warner and was his 22nd charted
song. It made it to number one and was on the charts for 24 weeks. |
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A lot of hit songs came from parts of
conversations or overheard conversations and according to Layng
Martine Jr., Billy "Crash" Craddock's hit song, "Rub It In" was such a tune!
Martine commented, "Before I moved to
Nashville, we were in our backyard behind our little duplex in
Connecticut. It was a sunny day and we were with our neighbors,
Somebody was lying in the sun and they had the sun tan lotion and they
just asked somebody if they'd rub it in. I just happened to have
my guitar and I started singing "Rub It In - Rub It In."
And my wife said to me, "If nobody has that, you need to write that
song." So I just started writing it and I had the verse and the
chorus right quick and that evening at our house, one of the neighbors
asked me if I had finished the song and I said, "no not yet, I want to
include a part about, "put a little in your nose ... a little between
your toes", and the rest of the song just happened right then and
there."
And later I was working at a fish
restaurant ... it was a little place on Long Island. I was the
worst restaurant operator that ever lived. And a year earlier, I
had gone down to visit Ray Stevens. He had told me that he liked
one of my songs and if I'd write another song that he liked as well
... that he would record me. So I went back home and started
writing and sending him songs every week. And one time I
included "Rub It In" on the cassette tape I had mailed him and he
called me as soon as he got the tape and told me that "Rub It In" was
a "complete smash" so he did record it with me singing and put it out
at the end of the summer of 1971. And the song was doing well,
but we ran out of summer and radio stations quit playing it because
summer was over. I moved to Nashville, Tennessee the following
year and I started pitching my version of the song around town and
music people told me that I couldn't get the song recorded because it
just wasn't a country song. But during that time, Billy "Crash"
Craddock was making those "fun records" and one day I took that song
along with a couple of others over to his producer and he told me he
was pretty sure that they would record two of my songs, including "Rub
It In." Now at that time I was working all night loading trucks
and I would write songs all day. And one day I came home and
they had left a message that "Rub It In" would be Craddock's next
single release. Now at that time, he was pretty hot. I
believe that was in February and the record came out in April and did
really well. So that song just changed my life.
"Rub It In Rub It In" entered the
country music charts as Craddock's 11th charted song in 1974 and
became his first number one. |
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Billy "Crash" Craddock
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A lot of hit
songs come from real life situations and according to Dickey Lee,
"She Thinks I Still Care," was just one of those songs!
Dickey
commented , "Back when I was going to school in Memphis, there was
this girl that I really liked. And she messed me all up.
She just didn't like me like I liked her. So after a while
she dumped me. And that's how that song came about.
But the neat thing about it is that we're still friends today.
And I tell a joke about that song when I sing it on stage. I
tell folks that this is the most successful song that I have ever
written and when I was writing the song I wasn't thinking about or
even trying to write a hit. I was just writing about this
girl that I liked and it worked out really well after she dumped
me because George Jones recorded the song and had a number one
record with it. A few years later, Anne Murray recorded it
and had a number one record with it, and Elvis recorded it.
So I finally made enough money off the song to put out a contract
on the girl and have her killed." Dickey is quick to say
that this is a joke -- except the part about the song being his
most successful as a songwriter!
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Dickey Lee |
George Jones |
George Jones'
"She Thinks I Still Care" made the country charts April 14th, 1962
and made it to number one where it stuck for six weeks. It
was Jones' 25th charted song and was on the charts for 23 weeks.
Anne Murray
changed the "she" to a "he" and her version made it to number one
in 1974.
Elvis
Presley's version was the flipside of his 1976 number one, "Moody
Blue." |
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Many hit songs were created because
someone helped someone else. According to Sonny
Throckmorton, Moe Bandy's 1979 hit song, "It's A Cheatin'
Situation" was one of those tunes.
Sonny commented, "Curly Putman and I
wrote "It's A Cheatin' Situation." That was during the time
when I was probably as low as I could get. Curly Putman was
one of those guys who really stepped up to the plate and gave me
the opportunity to be a writer. During that time, Curly and
I wrote several songs together and that was one of them. I'm
not sure just where we got the idea for that song, but more than
likely somebody said it accidentally at dinner time sometime or
another and one of us over heard it and got the idea from that.
And Moe Bandy made a great record on it.
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Moe Bandy |
Janie Fricke |
"It's A Cheatin' Situation" with
Janie Fricke harmony, entered the country charts January 27th,
1979 and peaked at number two. It was Bandy's 16th charted
song and was on the charts for 15 weeks. |
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A lot of song ideas have come to
songwriters while driving. According to Ed Bruce, the idea
for "Mamas Don't Let Your Babies Grow Up To Be Cowboys," came just
that way. Ed commented, "I moved from Memphis to Nashville,
Tennessee to be a songwriter ... a full time - 24 hour a day -
dedicated working musician. And I had gotten to a point in
my career where I was really busy doing commercials -- doing
jingles -- and I was doing very well with that. I was making
a good living doing what I was doing. And I was on my way
home one night from a jingle session ... and I'm almost home ...
I'm about ten minutes from home and I just started thinking about
all of it ... that this is not really why I came to Nashville.
Nobody knows what an Ed Bruce is. And I'm driving along ...
and you know that driving and riding along by yourself is great
songwriting time. And I just got to thinking to myself,
"Mama, why'd you let me grow up to be a guitar picker" or
something like that. And the idea kind of hit me. And
I thought, "well, I may have something here." So I kept
thinking about it and I changed "guitar pickers" to "cowboys" and
I still had guitars in there along with trucks and all that stuff.
And by the time I got home I had written the chorus and the first
verse to the song. And I kind of let it sit there and simmer
for a couple of weeks. And I finished it a couple of weeks
later. That was sort of a "personal protest song." |
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Ed Bruce |
Waylon and Willie |
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