Owens-Howard Set Revisits Bakersfield Scene

Bakersfield country music titan Owens has been such an influence on Dwight Yoakam that you can understand why some people in Nashville once referred to Yoakam as “Buckaroo.”

But Yoakam, who even had a hit duet with Owens on “Streets of Bakersfield” in the late ‘80s, isn’t alone in falling under the spell of the beat-conscious country style that Owens perfected long before he became a co-star on the TV show “Hee Haw.”

The Beatles recorded a version of an Owens’ hit, “Act Naturally,” as the B-side of “Yesterday” in the ‘60s, and the long list of artists who have recorded such Owens’ songs as “Cryin’ Time” and “Together Again” include such landmark figures as Ray Charles and Emmylou Harris.

Owens’ most popular work can be found on “The Buck Owens Collection (1959-1990),” a boxed set from Rhino Records. This album--one of five Owens collections being released by Sundazed Records--is a far more modest package, but an engaging one.

First released in 1961, the album features Owens’ versions of 11 songs by the great country songwriter Harlan Howard.

The teaming was a natural because Howard was greatly influenced in the late ‘50s by the Bakersfield country scene that produced such vital artists as Owens, Merle Haggard and Tommy Collins.

Howard, a Kentucky native who moved to Los Angeles with dreams of becoming a songwriter, broke into country music in the late ‘50s when he wrote “Heartaches by the Number,” a song that not only became a country hit for Ray Price but also a No. 1 pop hit for Guy Mitchell.

Besides a robust, semi-shuffle beat common on the Bakersfield scene at the time, the song--and future Howard hits--featured the kind of clever wordplay that rivaled the best of Roger Miller, another great country writer from the ‘60s.

Owens, a Texan who moved to Bakersfield in 1951 and still lives there, had a big hit in 1961 with “Foolin’ Around,” a song he co-wrote with Howard. “Foolin’ Around” combined a happy beat with a heartbreak theme--a love-struck guy telling his two-timing wife that when she gets “tired of foolin’ around with two or three” to “come on home and fool around with me.”

After that success, Owens recorded an album of Howard songs, including “Heartaches by the Number” and “Pick Me Up on Your Way Down.” But the real treat is a song that never became a hit, though it has “smash” written all over it.

Titled “Heartaches for a Dime,” it is about a man who learns over the phone that his girlfriend has found someone else. “And that’s a lot of heartaches for a dime,” he sings. It’d be great for Yoakam even today, though with inflation, he’d probably have to change the title to “Heartaches for a Quarter.”

** George Jones & Tammy Wynette’s “Golden Ring” (Razor & Tie).

Here’s another great country music pairing. The album, which spent six months on the country charts in 1976, includes two of Jones’ and Wynette’s hit singles--the title track and the pop standard “Near You.”

Unfortunately, the collection doesn’t feature Jones and Wynette at their best. Because the album doesn’t contain any liner notes, you don’t know just when the tracks were recorded during the couple’s stormy relationship. Their marriage only lasted from 1969 to 1975, so this could have been recorded during the last months of the marriage, or afterward.

The information would be useful because it might help explain why Jones and Wynette don’t connect as strongly emotionally on the love songs as they should. The devotion on “Near You” seems distant, and they don’t really explore the pain of Owens’ “Cryin’ Time.” The highlight, ironically, is “Did You Ever?,” a playful story of a couple’s personal problems.

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