Buck Owens died

[william_brasky]

**** :mad:

RIP Buck

[william_brasky]

Singer Buck Owens, the flashy rhinestone cowboy who shaped the sound of country music with hits like "Act Naturally" and brought the genre to TV on the long-running "Hee Haw," died Saturday. He was 76.

Owens died at his home, said family spokesman Jim Shaw. The cause of death was not immediately known. Owens had undergone throat cancer surgery in 1993 and was hospitalized with pneumonia in 1997.

His career was one of the most phenomenal in country music, with a string of more than 20 No. 1 records, most released from the mid-1960s to the mid-1970s.

They were recorded with a honky-tonk twang that came to be known throughout California as the "Bakersfield Sound," named for the town 100 miles north of Los Angeles that Owens called home.

"I think the reason he was so well known and respected by a younger generation of country musicians was because he was an innovator and rebel," said Shaw, who played keyboards in Owens' band, the Buckaroos. "He did it out of the Nashville establishment. He had a raw edge."

Owens was modest when describing his aspirations.

"I'd like to be remembered as a guy that came along and did his music, did his best and showed up on time, clean and ready to do the job, wrote a few songs and had a hell of a time," he said in 1992.

An indefatigable performer, Owens played a red, white and blue guitar with fireball fervor. He and the Buckaroos wore flashy rhinestone suits in an era when flash was as important to country music as fiddles.

Among his biggest hits were "Together Again" (also recorded by Emmylous Harris), "I've Got a Tiger by the Tail," "Love's Gonna Live Here," "My Heart Skips a Beat" and "Waitin' in Your Welfare Line."

And he was the answer to this music trivia question: What country star had a hit record that was later done by the Beatles?

"Those guys were phenomenal," Owens once said.

Ringo Starr recorded "Act Naturally" twice, singing lead on the Beatles' 1965 version and recording it as a duet with Owens in 1989.

In addition to music, Owens had a highly visible TV career as co-host of "Hee Haw" from 1969 to 1986. With guitarist Roy Clark, he led viewers through a potpourri of country music and hayseed humor.

"It's an honest show," Owens told The Associated Press in 1995. "There's no social message — no crusade. It's fun and simple."

Owens himself could be rebellious, choosing among other things to label what he did "American music" rather than country.

"I took a little heat," he once said. "People asked me, `Isn't country music good enough for you?' "

He also criticized the syrupy arrangements of some country singers, saying "assembly-line, robot music turns me off."

After his string of hits, Owens stayed away from the recording scene for a decade, returning in 1988 to record another No. 1 record, "Streets of Bakersfield," with Dwight Yoakam.

He spent much of his time away concentrating on his business interests, which included a Bakersfield TV station and radio stations in Bakersfield and Phoenix.

"I never wanted to hang around like the punch-drunk fighter," he told The Associated Press in 1992.

He had moved to Bakersfield in 1951, hoping to find work in the thriving juke joints of what in the years before suburban sprawl was a truck-stop town on Highway 99, between Los Angeles and the San Francisco Bay area.

"We played rhumbas and tangos and sambas, and we played Bob Wills music, lots of Bob Wills music," he said, referring to the bandleader who was the king of Western swing.

"And lots of rock 'n' roll," he added.

Owens started recording in the mid-1950s, but gained little success until 1963 with "Act Naturally," his first No. 1 single.

Alvis Edgar Owens Jr. was born in 1929 outside Sherman, Texas, the son of a sharecropper. With opportunities scarce during the Depression, the family moved to Arizona when he was 8.

He dropped out of school at age 13 to haul produce and harvest crops, and by 16 he was playing music in taverns.

He once told an audience, "When I was a little bitty kid, I used to dream about playing the guitar and singing like some of those great people that we had the old, thick records of."

Owens' first wife, Bonnie Owens, sometimes performed with him and went on to become a leading backup singer after their divorce in 1955. She had occasional solo hits in the '60s, as well as successful duets with her second husband, Merle Haggard.

One of her two sons with Owens also became a singer, using the name Buddy Alan. He had a Top 10 hit in 1968, "Let the World Keep on a-Turnin'," and recorded a number of duets with his father.

In addition to Buddy, he is survived by two other sons, Michael and John.

[yermom]

There's a giant doing cartwheels, a statue wearin' high heels.
Look at all the happy creatures dancing on the lawn.
A dinosaur Victrola list'ning to Buck Owens.
Doo, doo, doo, Lookin' out my back door.

[usmc-sooner]

The streets of Bakersfield will never be the same

all he he ever did was act naturally

[Soonerbabeinbama]

Might be hard for the Buckaroos to find work now:(

[Howzit]

Gloom, despair, and agony on me.

[TUSooner]

I liked Hee-Haw.

[Sooner24]

You youngster don't remember he was the one that gave Dolly Parton her start on his TV show. Him and Dolly sure sold a lot of Breeze laundry detergent with Cannon Towels inside.

[slickdawg]

Ol' BR549 will never sell now. :(


RIP Buck!

[Okla-homey]

He's a pickin', and now heaven's a grinnin'

RIP Buck.

At least we still have Dwight Yoakum.

[swardboy]

You youngster don't remember he was the one that gave Dolly Parton her start on his TV show. Him and Dolly sure sold a lot of Breeze laundry detergent with Cannon Towels inside.

Porter Wagner, my man...Porter Wagner.:)

[Okla-homey]

Porter Wagner, my man...Porter Wagner.:)

Wagoner actually. Wagner was a kraut composer. Both of you need to deduct 2 points from your hillbilly account. Just saying.

http://img96.imageshack.us/img96/7906/zzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzz38.jpg (http://imageshack.us)

[MamaMia]

You youngster don't remember he was the one that gave Dolly Parton her start on his TV show. Him and Dolly sure sold a lot of Breeze laundry detergent with Cannon Towels inside.Thats interesting. I didnt know that. :)

Well, may Buck rest in peace. I'm glad he was bessed with a long and happy life. Thats nice. :)

[Sooner24]

Thats interesting. I didnt know that. :)

Well, may Buck rest in peace. I'm glad he was bessed with a long and happy life. Thats nice. :)


Dolly Rebecca Parton was born on January 19, 1946, one of 12 children of Robert Lee Parton, a tobacco farmer, and Avie Lee Parton (née Owens). Dolly grew up on a run-down farm in Locust Ridge, TN. At 12 she was appearing on Knoxville TV, and at 13 she was already recording on a small label and appearing at the Grand Ole Opry. After graduating from high school in Sevier County, Tennessee, in 1964, she moved to Nashville to launch her career as a country singer. She fell in love with Carl Dean, who ran an asphalt-paving business; they got married on May 30, 1966 (and they are still together). The next year, Dolly's singing caught the attention of Porter Wagoner. He hired Dolly to appear on his program, "The Porter Wagoner Show." Dolly stayed with the show for 7 years, their duets became famous, and she appeared with his group at the Grand Ole Opry; she also toured and sold records. By the time her hit "Joshua" reached #1 in 1970, her fame had overshadowed Porter's, and she struck out on her own, though still recording duets with him. She left him for good to become a solo artist in 1974.

As you can see I confused Buck and Porter. :O

[RUSH LIMBAUGH is my clone!]

Ole Buck and Johnny Cash owned country music in the '
60's.Their songs were hits in both the country and rock markets.

[bigdsooner]

dayum, rip buck

[Okla-homey]

Dolly Rebecca Parton was born on January 19, 1946, one of 12 children of Robert Lee Parton, a tobacco farmer, and Avie Lee Parton (née Owens). Dolly grew up on a run-down farm in Locust Ridge, TN. At 12 she was appearing on Knoxville TV, and at 13 she was already recording on a small label and appearing at the Grand Ole Opry. After graduating from high school in Sevier County, Tennessee, in 1964, she moved to Nashville to launch her career as a country singer. She fell in love with Carl Dean, who ran an asphalt-paving business; they got married on May 30, 1966 (and they are still together). The next year, Dolly's singing caught the attention of Porter Wagoner. He hired Dolly to appear on his program, "The Porter Wagoner Show." Dolly stayed with the show for 7 years, their duets became famous, and she appeared with his group at the Grand Ole Opry; she also toured and sold records. By the time her hit "Joshua" reached #1 in 1970, her fame had overshadowed Porter's, and she struck out on her own, though still recording duets with him. She left him for good to become a solo artist in 1974.

As you can see I confused Buck and Porter. :O

and Homey's grandpaw used to watch Porter's show and marvel at young Dolly's "hatracks." (his term, not mine)

[GDC]

Well, I'm back again for another night,
Of trying to break free from this sadness that I can't lay to rest.
This old honky-tonk sure does feel like home,
And the music with the laughter seem to soothe my loneliness.

So turn it on, turn it up, turn me loose,
From the memory that's driving me lonely, crazy and blue.
It helps me forget her, so the louder the better:
Hey mister, turn it on, turn it up, turn me loose.

If a tear should fall, if I should whisper her name,
To some stranger I'm holdin' while we're dancin' to an old Buck Owens song.
I know she won't mind, she won't even know.
She'll be dancing with a memory, crying teardrops of her own.

So turn it on, turn it up, turn me loose,
From the memory that's driving me lonely, crazy and blue.
It helps me forget her, so the louder the better:
Hey mister, turn it on, turn it up, turn me loose.

So turn it on, turn it up, turn me loose,
From the memory that's driving me lonely, crazy and blue.
It helps me forget her, so the louder the better:
Hey mister, turn it on, turn it up, turn me loose.
Yeah, mister, turn it on, turn it up, turn me loose.

[Beef]

Gloom, despair, and agony on me.
Times infinity. :(

[Tailwind]

RIP Buck