Roger Miller
Roger Miller's obituary in the New York Times of October 27, 1992 ran under the headline "Roger Miller, Quirky Country Singer and Songwriter, Is Dead at 56."
As condescending and limiting as that is, it does reflect how a lot of people thought of Miller -- the clown prince of country, the "down-home jester of pop" behind novelty hits like "Dang Me," "Do-Wacka-Do," "Chug-A-Lug," and "You Can't Roller Skate in a Buffalo Herd."
But like other novelty stars (Tiny Tim comes to mind), he had much more than that going on. He wrote and sang the irresistible classics "King of the Road" and "England Swings," as well as a slew of melancholy ballads that country stars lined up to record, and still do -- "Lock Stock and Teardrops," "When Two Worlds Collide," "Invitation to the Blues," "Husbands and Wives," and "One Dyin' and a Buryin'," the "Don't Fear the Reaper" of country music.
They aren't as universally known as his do-wacka-do hits, but the excellence of the ballads shows that if Roger Miller was a clown he was a sad one, a pop Pagliaccio. You can hear it in his wicked gift for writing songs that manage to be jaunty and sorrowful at the same time: "In the Summertime," "Attaboy Girl," "Engine Engine No. 9," and "Walking in the Sunshine," which contains what may be the ultimate Miller line, "Put a smile upon your face as if there's nothing wrong." [Emphasis added.] Then there's "Dad Blame Anything a Man Can't Quit," a jolly 1966 tune in which he describes his self-destruction, a project he unfortunately completed a quarter of a century later.
When Miller wrote about hard times and smiling through the tears he wasn't theorizing. He was born into the Depression in 1936, in Fort Worth, and was a toddler when his father died. His desperate mother farmed him out to an uncle in Oklahoma, likely the source of one of his oddest song titles, "My Uncle Used to Love Me But She Died." Legend has it he picked cotton to earn the $8 for his first guitar. An in-law, Sheb Wooley, bought him a fiddle. Sheb must have been an inspiration to him; he made his own novelty songs, recording "The Purple People Eater" and writing the "Hee-Haw" theme.
After a tour in the army during the Korean War, Miller headed to Nashville. He was not an overnight success. He played fiddle in Minnie Pearl's band, drums for Faron Young, and was a singing bellhop in a hotel. Gradually, he began to write standard, sturdy material that was recorded by George Jones, Johnny Paycheck, Jim Reeves, Ernest Tubb.
By 1960 he was recording his own work -- the deceptively upbeat "In the Summertime," the doleful "When Two Worlds Collide." It wasn't until 1964 that he began making the novelty records for which he's still best known. His sauntering vocal delivery, goony hillbilly scat and ingenious, serenely cartoonish lyrics made them giant hits around the world, earned him trunkloads of cash (which flowed right through him), and won him shelves of Grammy awards. But he'd built himself a jester's ghetto and he knew it. A lot of drinking, chain-smoking and romantic turmoil ensued. "Dang Me" was at least semi-autobiographical.
He began doing other people's songs, including Dennis Linde's charming "Tom Green County Fair." In 1968 he went so far as to record an entire album of other people's schmaltz, A Tender Look at Love, that was as far as he could run from his rodeo clown image. On it were "By the Time I Get to Phoenix," "Honey," "The Twelfth of Never," and Bobby Russell's "Little Green Apples," with its jangly and curiously Millerish apples/Indianapolis rhyme.
In 1973 he wrote songs and voiced Allan-a-Dale for Disney's animated Robin Hood. That year he also released Dear Folks, Sorry I Haven't Written Lately, an album with more of his own songs. Two of them are among his gloomiest ever: "The Animal of Man" with the lines "And his traces can be found/ In the dying streams and meadows/ And he'll kill you if he can/ He's the animal of man". "Mama Used to Love Me But She Died," a reworking of the uncle one, is another example of his genius for the upbeat-but-sad. By this point he was barely cracking a smile through the tears.
He hadn't done much noteworthy for a decade when he pulled himself together for his last triumph, writing the songs for the 1985 Broadway musical Big River, based on Huckleberry Finn. He handily showed off his range, from the gloriously gospelish "The Crossing" to the more Millerish "The Royal Nonesuch" and "Guv'mint." The show was a hit and he won a TONY for it, the first country songwriter ever to win one.
After that, a lifetime of chain-smoking and other bad habits -- "Dad Blame Anything a Man Can't Quit" -- caught up with him. But his songs are still loved, especially by musicians, and if anything the depth and range of his talent is better appreciated now than when he was a star.
by John Strausbaugh