The Grand Tour (6 page)

Moving around East Texas and the Gulf Coast, with and without Sonny, George found honky-tonks had a different status depending on the area. In rural East Texas, there were never a ton of them. Texas music researcher Andrew Brown points out that in Baptist areas, cities and counties (including the Thicket) were dry. In other places, honky-tonks were relegated to the outskirts of town. One exception: Port Arthur, where the heavily Catholic (and Cajun) population meant bars and clubs weren't pushed to the city limits. That also wasn't a problem in Houston. George was playing at a honky-tonk known as Amma Dee's on Canal Street in late August or early September 1954 when he stopped by a nearby Prince's drive-in. In business since 1934, Prince's was, and remains, a beloved local chain known for burgers—and carhops. He set eyes on one: eighteen-year-old Shirley Ann Corley of Tenaha, Texas, north of the Thicket.

Shirley came to Houston that summer to escape rural poverty. After her father, Bryan Corley, died in a railroad accident, her mother remarried to a man who farmed and did little else. After high school graduation, she headed for the city for the summer, expecting to return home and marry her steady boyfriend from high school. When that relationship fell apart, she signed on at Prince's. George urged her to come see him at the club. They married on September 14. The flames of youthful romance initially
blinded both as they entered what for George was his second square-peg-round-hole relationship. Throughout their fourteen-year marriage, Shirley could never fully accept her husband's unyielding commitment to his career. She wasn't pleased when he insisted they relocate from Houston to Beaumont, where cheaper housing was easily found. They moved into a one-story home at 2650½ Magnolia Street. Beaumont's city directory listed him not as an entertainer or singer, but as an announcer at KTRM. Between that salary, income from the honky-tonks, and what he was paid for playing the Jamboree
,
he cobbled together a living.

Starday had a publicity shot of George that showed him with slicked-back hair, most of it covered by a white cowboy hat, wearing a light-colored embroidered western shirt. Every Starday act had such photos, even those whose records, like his, made few if any waves. The real turbulence involved Starday's cofounders and their diverging perspectives about the company. Starns, ever the manager-promoter, felt as he did at the start: the label was a marketing tool for whatever act or acts he managed. Daily, supported by Pierce, who assumed the title of president and handled the business affairs from LA, sensed the label was set for growth. Starns and Neva were about to divorce. Starns, who'd had his ups and downs in the business, finally opted to abandon his music interests, selling his half of Starday to Pappy. His daughter told Starday authority Nate Gibson her father declared, “I've had enough of these hillbillies!” After the divorce, Starns remarried and began retailing mobile homes in the Deep South. Neva moved to Springfield, Missouri, home of the Ozark Jubilee, and continued to manage acts.

With Pappy and Pierce running Starday, Pappy still produced records around Houston. He had access to better recording facilities thanks to a backdoor investment in Bill Quinn's Gold Star
Studio in Houston, originally a homegrown operation similar to the Starns living room setup. George and other Starday acts recorded there. He remained popular on the Jamboree
,
yet record sales continued to lag, his vocals enthusiastic but still too imitative. He may have wanted his own voice, but he kept on invoking his heroes when he sang.

George became fast friends with Frankie Miller, a singer and Columbia recording artist from Victoria, Texas, who joined the Jamboree cast sometime in early 1955. George's stage presence also impressed him. “The people really liked him from the first time I saw him. They used to encore him on that show. He'd sing some of the things he had out, but he would sing other songs, and man, they would just love him.” George kept the crowds laughing with self-deprecating wisecracks. Miller remembered the time George had a barber buzz his slicked down hair, returning to the haircut he sported in the marines. “He would come out with that flattop and say, ‘I got this flattop. You all can see my big ears now!'” Miller took special note of George's physical approach to singing. “He would kind of bow his legs [and crane his neck] and kind of grit—sing through his teeth a lot, with his mouth almost shut.” Alcohol, Miller recalled, didn't interfere with George's performances at that point. “We worked at a lot of clubs together. He was always good. I never saw him when he couldn't do a show. I've seen him so damn drunk almost that he couldn't hardly walk. And he would get out onstage and sing like a damn mockingbird. No matter how much drink he had, he'd get that guitar and sing. Of course, after the show, down in the dressing room, he'd be drunker than hell, but he never missed a show when I was with him.”

For club work, George had a band: steel guitarist R.C. Martin, guitarist Donnie Broussard, drummer Lennie Benoit, and pianist Pee Wee Altenberry. They generally carried no bass unless Raymond
Nallie, Luther's brother, sat in. “If it had a Falstaff [beer] sign, we played there,” Martin recalled. “There was the Super 73 Club in Winnie. We never did play [in Beaumont] at Yvonne's with him or the Blue Jean Club. Smaller clubs. There used to be a lot of them. Played in Louisiana. Just around that area there. Sundays, we played out in a drive-in theater on a flatbed truck. That was a job we had for quite a while with him. He often played four hours at a clip.”

Like most regional singers playing local clubs, George couldn't pay his sidemen much. Martin remembered how the musicians wrangled a two-dollar raise when they played the Super 73 Club, thanks to Raymond Nallie. “George was payin' us ten dollars, which was [union] scale,” Martin said. “He was makin' pretty good money . . . about one hundred or a little better a night. When we drove up, Raymond was outside. He says, ‘Stop right here. Don't go in. Don't take a step in.' We said, ‘What's the matter?' He said, ‘He's gonna pay us twelve dollars a night, or we're not gonna play.' George come out and him and Raymond argued around for a while and he said, ‘Okay, I'll pay you twelve dollars a night.' And we went and played the job.”

George bought a used 1951 Packard to get to gigs, complete with his name and label painted below the chrome trim, along with
BMT. TEX
and a phone number. Luther Nallie rode with him on one job. “George came by to pick me up after he got that contract with Starday. He bought him a Packard from some used-car dealer and it was kind of a bright purple and he had all the way across in yellow letters,
GEORGE JONES . . . STARDAY RECORDING ARTIST
. He came by and picked me up in that thing. He thought that was really something.”

George in those days was still a man of the Thicket, holding on to the mind-sets and prejudices he grew up with.

“I was in San Antone on a show he did,” Frankie Miller
remembered, “and a young black guy come back to the drinkin' fountain! George said, ‘You can't drink there! Get the hell away from there!' Run his ass away from that drinkin' fountain.” Over time, his views would evolve, not unlike those of Johnny Cash and other singers raised in the Deep South. “We were raised like that,” Johnny Bush commented, “and we had to get over it.”

His redemption on records came through an old Thicket pal and amateur poet: Darrell Edwards. Twelve years older than George, they knew each other in Saratoga. Edwards served in the Coast Guard, heard about George's singing, and reconnected with him. The two would begin kicking ideas around. He gave George a wry, catchy number titled “Why, Baby, Why” with enough potential that it also impressed Pappy. George, who added some ideas of his own, got a cowriter credit. He took it to his next date at Gold Star in the summer of 1955. Some accounts indicate Sonny Burns was expected at the session—since Pappy saw “Why, Baby, Why” as a George-Sonny duet—and that George overdubbed vocal harmonies after Sonny, likely on a drunk, didn't show.

The Hank Williams–style vocal aside, the catchy chorus of “Why” (“Tell me why baby, why baby, why baby, why, you made me cry baby, cry baby, cry baby, cry”) gave it a commerciality his previous records lacked. Three more Edwards numbers went to tape that day, including a wrenching ballad titled “Seasons of My Heart” that again featured George relying on Lefty's characteristic habit of stretching words. As always, despite the improved studio, production values remained nonexistent. As George later admitted to Nick Tosches, “There was no such thing as production at Starday,” noting the arrangements were hurriedly done, and even bad notes didn't much concern Pappy. “If we went a little flat or sharp in a place or two, they'd say ‘The public ain't gonna notice that, so put it out.'”

Pappy and Don Pierce paired “Why” and “Seasons” on a single, promoting “Seasons” as the stronger tune. In an August 7, 1955, form letter sent to “country music DJ's” with a copy of the disc, Pierce thanks them for past support, then turns on the hard sell, declaring, “Right now, we have a record that in our opinion is about the best we have ever released. We hope we can ask you occasionally to ‘really lay on one' for us and we think George Jones ‘SEASONS OF MY HEART' is worthy of special consideration.” He adds, “The reverse side ‘WHY BABY WHY' is also very strong.” Clearly, Pierce sensed the ballad was the stronger performance and the one more likely to make radio take notice.

George doubled down on self-promotion. On August 24, he heard about a Louisiana Hayride traveling show at the high school football field in Conroe, Texas, north of Houston. Headlining was the Hayride's hottest singer: Sun recording artist Elvis Presley, supported by Hayride favorite and future star Johnny Horton and singer Betty Amos. George arrived before showtime and cajoled MC Horace Logan into letting him perform, explaining he had a new Starday single about to drop. Logan agreed. Pierce had clearly miscalculated which tune would prove stronger. In their October review of the single,
Billboard
reported that “Why Baby Why” was scoring big in Memphis, Texas, and Louisiana, momentum that had begun in September and continued through most of October. The Hayride booked him for an October 1 guest appearance. The timing was fortunate, since George and Shirley welcomed their first son, Jeffrey Glenn Jones, that fall. But if the public liked “Why Baby Why,” so did former Hayride star Webb Pierce (no relation to Don Pierce). Pappy recorded Pierce for Four Star in 1949. After becoming one of the Hayride's top stars, Pierce landed a Decca recording contract, joined the Opry, and became one of America's top country singers. His honky-tonk hits
for Decca—“Wondering,” “Back Street Affair, “There Stands the Glass,” “Slowly,” and others—showcased his distinctive, expressive tenor. Pierce wanted to record “Why” as a duet with Hayride pal and fellow Decca artist Red Sovine.

In Nashville, Webb was considered a great singer, but a hard-nosed businessman and a mercenary when it came to the bottom line. Pierce claimed he learned business fundamentals working as a department manager at Shreveport's Sears Roebuck before becoming a full-time performer. He and Opry manager Jim Denny co-owned Cedarwood, a Nashville song publishing company. Pierce often aided new songwriters, including newcomer Mel Tillis, by recording their tunes—provided they gave him half ownership. The line usually worked when he'd tell them half of something was better than all of nothing. Many times, he was correct. This time, Webb didn't ask for a piece of the song. Supposedly, remembering Pappy's early support, he offered to delay his version of the song to give George a head start and more exposure.

Whether he did or didn't make such an offer, Pierce and Sovine didn't record “Why Baby Why” in Nashville until October 27, 1955. Decca rush-released their single. It took off, yet didn't dent the momentum of George's. The two versions ran neck and neck in regional markets that fall, as Tennessee Ernie Ford's “Sixteen Tons” grabbed and held the No. 1 position nationwide.

George's single continued to rise. He became a Hayride cast member on February 4. A week later, Pierce and Sovine's “Why” knocked “Sixteen Tons” out of No. 1. George's version reached No. 4 in store sales. In all, he was triumphant. He had his first national hit, and Starday had a single whose success outdid “Y'all Come.”

Bob Sullivan was KWKH's engineer even before the Hayride began in 1948. He'd seen future icons appear on the stage
at Shreveport's Municipal Auditorium: Hank, Webb, Elvis, Jim Reeves, Horton, Johnnie and Jack, Kitty Wells, and others. He, too, marveled at George's onstage physicality. “I called it hard singin'. When he would sing one of his songs, if the note was high, he would bow his neck up. And you could tell that he was workin' at it. And we used to laugh at him. Once in a while he'd come offstage and some old boy'd say, ‘I didn't see you bow your neck tonight!'” His flair for cutting up onstage continued as he worked Elvis imitations into his act.

While Hayride acts commonly drank backstage, Jones took things to another level. “He was the nicest guy in the world,” Sullivan admitted. “But when he got drunk, he got mean drunk. He would cuss and raise Cain and they would have to keep him away from a microphone, 'cause he didn't watch what he was doin'. I saw him one night, he was so drunk they wouldn't put him on for his last song.” Every artist did two or three appearances during a Hayride broadcast. When the show ended, KWKH followed with a disc-jockey program from the studio, cohosted by a different Hayride artist each week, driven to the studio from the auditorium. One week it was George's turn. He began the evening in good shape, but, Sullivan added, “By the time he did his third appearance on the Hayride, he started drinkin'.”

When the time came to take him to the studio, things were in free fall. “He was so drunk he couldn't stand up,” Sullivan continued. “And they had two girls, one was on each side of him, draggin' him to the studio. He was ready to go on, but he was so drunk he was out of it. He showed up at the station and the DJ got up, opened the door, and invited him in. He saw the shape he was in. He said, ‘Girls, don't bring him in. I'm not puttin' him on the air!' They never did ask him anymore because he was unreliable.”