Jack Sparks remembers Buck Owens

Wherein Jack Sparks has been away too long


Jack writes:

Between 1963 and 1967, doing everything EXACTLY OPPOSITE of the way they were doing it in Nashville, Buck Owens had 15 number 1 Country songs.

He was a complex man, and eulogizing him in this space is difficult because he had an extreme distaste for being poor. Any part of the creative Buck that wasn't killed by Hee Haw, definitely died in 1974 with Don Rich in that motorcycle accident. He had some fun with Dwight Yoakam later in life, but the "fuck you" money he made by going on TV and slowly building his entertainment empire, stole the spark.

Make no mistake, though. What he did between 1963 and 1967 was pure.

read the rest