Roger Murrah Interview
Doug Burke:
Welcome to Back Story Song. I'm your host Doug Burke, and today we're here with Roger Murrah. Nashville's songwriter Hall of Famer Roger Murrah was born in Athens, Georgia. When he was a child, his father traded a used pickup truck for a piano. Roger taught himself how to play it. And as he once said, "Since I'd learned by ear I always kept it simple, didn't ever really want it to get too complicated." After leaving the army in 1968, he signed as a staff songwriter at the legendary Muscle Shoals recording studio and went on to open his own Huntsville, Alabama recording studio. A true independent he published and mentored many up-and-coming songwriters, and it is credited with founding the Nashville Songwriters Hall of Fame. His songwriting and mentorship style emphasized less is more. Clearly, this style worked as he wrote 10 number one songs and 44 Top 40 songs. His songs have been recorded by country music royalty. So we're here with Roger Murrah, and you're part of the Nashville Songwriters Hall of Fame. And we're honored to have you here. We're here to talk about some of your songs.
Roger Murrah:
Thank you, Doug.
Doug Burke:
You grew up in Alabama.
Roger Murrah:
Mm-hmm
Doug Burke:
And your first recorded song I have is, It's Raining in Seattle by Wynn Stewart.
Roger Murrah:
Yeah, it was the first charted song.
Doug Burke:
Charted song.
Roger Murrah:
I wrote some others, but-
Doug Burke:
It's the most redundant title I've interviewed someone on.
Roger Murrah:
I know.
Doug Burke:
It's Raining in Seattle. It's like if you stay in Seattle, you know it's raining.
Roger Murrah:
You know what? I wasn't that well-traveled, and I didn't even know that. I didn't even know it rained in Seattle all the time. And it's also has a large number of suicides in that area as well, but that was very interesting to find out later. But yeah, that was my first title that charted. Wynn Stewart was a fantastic country singer, he kind of came through the Bakersfield group of people.
Doug Burke:
So tell me about the story behind that song. You weren't from Seattle?
Roger Murrah:
No, I wasn't and I don't know. It came from kind of a sad emotion I was going through. And that's just the way I expressed it. The interesting thing about that record, Wynn Stewart was not the most dependable guy in the world, and had drinking problems, unfortunately. The head of the label that he was on at the time, which was RCA, Jerry Bradley tried to get in touch with him and he never did even check in and he was charting and they wanted to run it off the charts, but they couldn't get Wynn to participate. So they basically just dropped the record. So that was unfortunate for all of us, especially me because it was my first shot at that, so just one of the many, many things that happened along the way.
Doug Burke:
But this song wasn't about your personal situation.
Roger Murrah:
Not really not-
Doug Burke:
Like a lot artists-
Roger Murrah:
No, it began with chords me playing on the piano, which I learned to kind of play. I never did really learn how to play well. But I learned a few chords and every time I'd learn a new chord, it would inspire me to write two three songs because I could mix that new chord up with three or four chords I already knew, and just turn it around every which way. So I have a real country story about being a piano player, my daddy traded a pickup truck for an old acoustic piano years ago. And I learned to play by here, and a couple other siblings as well. That's how it all started, really.
Doug Burke:
Your first charting song was My Silver Lining.
Roger Murrah:
Well, It's Raining in Seattle was the first-
Doug Burke:
Sorry, first top 10 song-
Roger Murrah:
Exactly.
Doug Burke:
... was My Silver Lining by Mickey Gilley?
Roger Murrah:
Yes. And my sister and I wrote that, Tina. Tina and I actually got to sing harmony with Mickey on that record, so she was all excited about that. But yeah, I believe we were top five with it..
Doug Burke:
And so what's the story behind My Silver Lining?
Roger Murrah:
My songs originated very young, I don't know what you would call it, songwriter fashion. I don't always live the stories. But I've lived the emotion somewhere. The idea of the song was you must be my silver lining. It's like, the girl was the one who made everything work out well. I wish I had a better story for you. But I was sitting down at the piano and that kind of came out.
Doug Burke:
So in 1981, you had a very successful year. You had A Bridge That Just Won't Burn by Conway Twitty.
Roger Murrah:
Mm-hmm.
Doug Burke:
Also, Southern Rains by Mel Tillis that year.
Roger Murrah:
Yes.
Well, Southern Rains, of course, was my first number one record. When I sat down to write that song, I really was just expressing my love for the South. And I didn't even think about it being a commercial song. If someone had asked me at the time, I'll just tell him I was writing about the South. I love the South. It was no bigger surprise to anyone than it was to me that it did so well in the charts. And Jimmy Bowen who produced Mel, at the time. For some reason he had gotten a hold of some of my songs and he started really being a flag-waver for me and Jimmy was a ... He was a renowned executive in town, had a lot of labels and fired a lot of people and he also brought digital to Nashville. But anyhow, he was into my writing and was very good to me as a producer on that label, I believe it was MCA. I was thrilled to get that recording. I'll have to confess something, though, with all due respect to everybody, especially Mel. The record sounded a little stiff to me because the rhythm of it was just not what we demoed, and of what I heard in the song. And so it was a real mixture of emotions when it was number one. I was also a little embarrassed by it because I knew it could sound so much better. It's kind of weird. It's a weird thing, but I was very grateful and always have been and still am grateful to everybody who helped us have it. But it was about my life really.
Doug Burke:
In Alabama?
Roger Murrah:
Mm-hmm. The things I spoke of-
Doug Burke:
That all trains the hummingbird.
Roger Murrah:
Yeah, the hummingbird. I used to hear my mother talk about it. I think it ran from New Orleans to up further north, maybe Chicago, I'm not sure. But I just love the sound of that. And that's why I put it in the song.
Doug Burke:
Seek is a feeling that a body can't get over.
Roger Murrah:
So that was just speaking to the fact that I missed where I grew up. I missed home missed family. I came to Nashville in 1972. And must say, I'm a proud Tennessean now. I love Middle Tennessee, and I love Nashville. Nashville's been good to me. It really has.
Doug Burke:
Why is that?
Roger Murrah:
Well, because I was just accepted by so many people that they didn't have any real reason to give me the time of day, really. Bobby Bare who actually kind of discovered me gave me my first deal. Bobby was a great country singer and interpreter of songs and he is also two of the best ears for songs Nashville has ever heard. He was one of the first to record people like Chris Stapleton and Tom T. Hall, John Schafer. Oh man, it just goes on and on. His ear for music was just amazing. And Bobby's still living and not in the best of health. But he's a wonderful man.
Doug Burke:
So you were part of his writing core?
Roger Murrah:
Yes.
Doug Burke:
And you co-wrote a lot of songs. Your sister Tina, Scott Anders, Keith Stegall.
Roger Murrah:
Mm-hmm.
Doug Burke:
Jim McBride.
Roger Murrah:
Yeah. I mostly co-wrote, really. Southern Rains, I wrote by myself. I've written other songs by myself. But at a time when I was with Tom Collins Music, I'm skipping around here, but I used to tell people every day, I was either starting or finishing a song with a different person. Marcus Harmon's first number one record was Only Love by Wynonna. Marcus and I wrote that song. I wrote, the first number one I believe that James Dean Hicks ever had was Goodbye Time, which he and I wrote together. That was his first. And so it wasn't unusual for me to get with people. Well, like when I got with Alan Jackson, he hadn't had any activity either. He was singing demos. Keith Stegall, who was ended up producing everything and Alan. He saw what the potential was in Alan, and honestly, I must say, I didn't really see that myself. But he made his point. And when Alan himself wrote Where Were You When the World Stood Still, I believe he really won me over as a songwriter, that was a masterpiece. Where Were You (When the World Stopped Turning), I believe was the title. Singing about when the bombing happened in New York.
Doug Burke:
You had a lot of success writing for the Oak Ridge Boys, or they picked up your songs.
Roger Murrah:
Yeah.
Doug Burke:
Often co-written with James Dean Hicks.
Roger Murrah:
Yeah.
Doug Burke:
The first one to go to number one was It Takes a Little Rain (To Make Love Grow)?
Roger Murrah:
Yeah.
Seems like we may have written the chorus first on that song. And I just loved how the title fit the melodic structure of that. They've always been big fans of my work and it wasn't unusual at all for them to call me when they were getting ready to record and see if I had anything that they haven't heard, or anything that I wanted to remind them off, that I may have pitched them already. They've been really good to me.
Doug Burke:
And so when you're collaborating with your co-writers on something like that, what part of the song do you try to contribute or do you try to contribute everywhere you can?
Roger Murrah:
Well, I'm really all over the place. I'm usually kind of the referee of the session, I kind of lead. I would benefit as an older writer from the new ideas and fresh ideas from the younger writers, then I would have the experience to try to put ideas that they had into a more melodic lyric or something. So I contributed in all kinds of ways, no particular way. But I've always written melody and lyric. I'm kind of known in some circles as a song doctor. I'm a real good editor, and without meaning to sound boastful, I may be one of the best song editors in town really. And of course, that's a dying breed of people, too.
Doug Burke:
What do you think about when you're editing songs?
Roger Murrah:
Well, less is more is kind of a very common thing. Less lyric, more powerful lyric. I've never been real wordy with lyrics. I try to say the most I can with the least amount of lyric. And sometimes a lyric can be shaped and made better by a word being singular or plural. It just matters how it sings, like a singular lyric will use the scene better than a plural lyric. And so sometimes it's a matter of taking out an apostrophe, and things like that. It's very, very detail-oriented to do it well. I think with all due respect to our young writers these days, they set a little quicker than they should, the rhyming is not as good as it once was. They will use bad rhymes just to kind of get through the line when they need to be spending more time on real rhyme. And so that's kind of disappointing, but hey, they're getting away with it and some of them are becoming hits. So it's hard to argue with them. But as a lyricist, I do argue with them. I think they need to be paying more attention to keep the craft alive.
Doug Burke:
In 1989 Alabama discovered you.
Roger Murrah:
Yeah.
Doug Burke:
And you had two number ones. Their record Southern Star.
Roger Murrah:
Mm-hmm.
Doug Burke:
High Cotton and Southern Star. Talk about the making of High Cotton because this is a controversial subject but in some respects, today the whole way down in Dixie thing, might not be as politically correct as it was-
Roger Murrah:
Interesting that you bring it up. I've never heard that before but-
Doug Burke:
Maybe I'm off the mark.
Roger Murrah:
Well-
Doug Burke:
And I probably am.
Roger Murrah:
Well, are you thinking that it came from an old African American spiritual? Are you talking about that?
Doug Burke:
Well, does it come from that?
Roger Murrah:
It may very well. But anyhow, the song is really about my life.
Doug Burke:
It's a place.
Roger Murrah:
Yeah. We were walking in hot cotton. In other words, we were poor people, but we didn't feel like poor people. We felt like we were rich because of the love in the family. We did kind of borrow the melody in we were walking in high cotton, old times they're not forgotten. That's from an old hymn. And it could very well be an old Negro spiritual, really. I'm just not sure about that. I need to look into that.
Doug Burke:
Well, isn't that a line in the song Dixie? I Wish I Was in Dixie? Good times, they're not forgotten.
Roger Murrah:
Yeah. Exactly. But that came from somewhere else.
Doug Burke:
That came from somewhere else, for sure.
Roger Murrah:
Yeah, exactly. Mickey Newbury, one of my favorite writers in the world. He wrote that and well actually did kind of assembled the trilogy. That's what he did, actually. Those are three different songs that he put together.
Doug Burke:
In what? In High Cotton?
Roger Murrah:
No, in his song. Well, that's just one song. There are three songs in that song.
Doug Burke:
Oh, really?
Roger Murrah:
The one that Elvis ended up recording and everybody else. A lot of people record it. But it was a trilogy that Mickey Newberry arranged from three old songs. But anyhow, High Cotton we borrowed from some of that lyric kind of thing, yes. We did it for the effect it would have on our song. In other words, it would let people reminisce and it also let them feel the feeling of the spiritual aspect of it. To borrow that was part of the inspiration in the song really.
Doug Burke:
So you've written the song about your home state, Alabama.
Roger Murrah:
Mm-hmm.
Doug Burke:
How does it get to Alabama? How does it get to ...
Roger Murrah:
I don't remember how that one got to them. I think my publisher probably pitched it. I've got a better story about another song they recorded.
Doug Burke:
Sure, go ahead, tell me.
Roger Murrah:
The song I'm in a Hurry (And Don't Know Why).
Doug Burke:
Okay.
Roger Murrah:
That Randy VanWarmer and I wrote and Alabama recorded and had a monstrous hit on that. And it was at a time when their career was kind of at a low. So they really needed a hit song. I was walking out the door of our office because Alabama had called for me to bring the songs. So as I was walking out, my former wife, she called me about that time and she asked me if I was taking I'm in a Hurry. I said, "No." And she said, "You have to take it." And so that was one of those times where I didn't think myself out of it. I just picked up a copy of it and took it with me. And they just loved it. They wanted to copy the baseline in it. They loved everything about it. So kind of long story short, they had a monstrous hit on that song. And it was because my wife just accidentally mentioned it. And I accidentally took it and didn't think enough about it to whether I may have changed my mind, I don't know. But I didn't, I just took it. And they ended up sending her a dozen yellow roses. So she loved that.
Doug Burke:
It has kind of an acapella feel to it.
Roger Murrah:
Yeah. Randy VanWarmer, he's deceased now, unfortunately. But he had that huge pop song. You left me Just When I Needed You Most. It was huge. He recorded that and wrote it. I think I've since heard it was about his car. I thought he told me one time it was about his dad, but it was a worldwide hit. But anyhow, Randy ended up moving to Nashville. And we wrote a lot together. And he called me about this idea he had, I said, "What kind of idea is it?" He said, "It's called I'm in a Hurry to get things done or something." And we just sat down and wrote it fairly quickly.
Doug Burke:
You wrote it in a hurry.
Roger Murrah:
Yes. And we didn't know why because the song says, "I'm in a hurry and don't know why." But everybody felt like it was their song because we're all in a hurry.
Doug Burke:
So you took it to Randy Owen?
Roger Murrah:
Yes. They were recording down the street, and I took it down and basically left it. I didn't stay for them to play anything. And they called me later and told me-
Doug Burke:
That same day?
Roger Murrah:
Yeah.
Doug Burke:
And said don't take it anywhere else.
Roger Murrah:
Oh, yeah.
Doug Burke:
This is-
Roger Murrah:
Yeah, we're going to do this.
Doug Burke:
... an Alabama song.
Roger Murrah:
Yeah.
Doug Burke:
And that went to number one.
Roger Murrah:
Oh, yeah. That was a very stout hit.
Doug Burke:
Probably your biggest song, isn't really a country song?
Roger Murrah:
Yeah.
Doug Burke:
We're in This Love Together by Al Jarreau.
Roger Murrah:
That's right. It was a worldwide hit by Al and Keith Stegall and I wrote that.
Keith came in one day when I was at the office already. So he walked in and I said, "Hey, Keith, come here a minute." He came over and I said, "What do you think about this title? We're in This Love Together?" He said, "I like it, but it doesn't sound country to me." He sat down and started writing the riff that ended up in the record. He started writing a guitar kind of riff and we started writing that song.
Roger Murrah:
And if I'm not mistaken, we wrote everything about the song but the line, berries on the vine it gets sweeter all the time. I actually wrote that line, driving home that afternoon when I passed the exit at Brentwood, Tennessee. And I still recall writing that line. When you're driving, it's a good time to write when there's no one else in the car and you don't have the radio on. It's just a good time for some reason to think about lines. So I wrote that last line, so we were finished with it within a day's setting, actually.
Doug Burke:
I like that because it breaks one of the Nashville rules in that, it's not an actual rhyme. And it almost takes a jazz singer like Al Jarreau to make it sound like a rhyme.
Roger Murrah:
What do you mean?
Doug Burke:
Because time and vine are not a perfect rhyme.
Roger Murrah:
Oh, yeah.
Doug Burke:
I don't know if he knows that about that song. So many of the rhymes in it are not perfect rhymes. Romantic and planned it.
Roger Murrah:
Mm-hmm.
Doug Burke:
Together and forever, of course, are. But did you think about that at all?
Roger Murrah:
-that's interesting.
Doug Burke:
Because you can get rejected on a song because it's not in Nashville.
Roger Murrah:
Well-
Doug Burke:
Maybe that's changed.
Roger Murrah:
... actually, I was so particular about rhyming. I'm surprised I let myself by with some of that. But it was close enough. It had to be close enough.
Doug Burke:
It sounds like a rhyme.
Roger Murrah:
I was not going for it. It's interesting that you mentioned it though because some of it they are kind of false rhymes a bit.
Doug Burke:
Yeah, false rhymes. That's the word I'm looking for.
Roger Murrah:
Yeah, I guess the public let us by with it. But there is false rhyme, absolutely.
Doug Burke:
So this comes out in 1981. How does this get to Al Jarreau on the Breakin' Away album? This is a very different song from the rest of the songs you've written.
Roger Murrah:
Well, there was a guy pitching songs for April Blackwood at that time. Now April Blackwood was the company that co-published the company I worked for. And it, later on, became CBS Songs, which later on became bought up. But anyhow, Ed Thomas was pitching songs. And he shot that song out there and basically in the dark, just sent it out there. I don't even know that he sent it to Al Jarreau, I think he may have sent it to an A&R department for Warner Brothers at the time. But somehow someone took it over to Al. And I hope I'm not mistaken on this, Ed could have actually sent it for Al to hear. And weeks go by and we get a phone call. And they said, "Al was listening to cassettes last night, and he found this song We're in This Love Together, and he loved it, he just absolutely loved it. And he said he was going to record it." So I didn't know who Al Jarreau was. I don't guess any of us did, really because he was pretty much jazz. And we weren't following jazz as closely as ... So anyhow, I went downtown and bought an album by him called This Time. And I played that album, and I came back the next day and told people around the office, I said, "I don't know what he's going to do to our song, but it's going to be great. This guy is amazing." And sure enough, it really was a match made in heaven. I don't know who else could have ever done it like he did it. And he was always so grateful to us for that song as we were to him because he's no longer with us, unfortunately. But I went to do an interview up in Buffalo, New York, that they were doing a documentary on Al's life and met his older sister, and she was so nice. She came over she lived in Canada. She came over and spoke to me. And she said, "I want to thank you all for taking my brother to AM Radio. And what basically what she was talking about to pop radio because his background was pretty much jazz. He was a purist for good reason. That song fit him so well, and it crossed the genres from jazz to pop. Her whole family was so grateful that we helped him go pop.
Doug Burke:
Yeah, and for you and Keith, it crossed from country to pop.
Roger Murrah:
Oh, yeah.
Doug Burke:
It went to number 15 on the pop charts.
Roger Murrah:
It still gets airplay all the time.
Doug Burke:
It's standard at weddings. Have you been at a wedding where they played it?
Roger Murrah:
I haven't.
Doug Burke:
You haven't?
Roger Murrah:
No, I'd love for that to happen.
Doug Burke:
That's not happened? Have you been in a karaoke bar where someone was singing it?
Roger Murrah:
No, but I heard about it a lot. I've heard about people do it. But I'll tell you a funny story that happened to me on We're in This Love Together. I was in Paris, of all places for me. Going up the Eiffel Tower, and at that time, they had a thing called MUSAC. Remember MUSAC?
Doug Burke:
Sure.
Roger Murrah:
So there I was going up the Eiffel Tower and my song came on, We're In This Love Together. I said, "Oh man, my song is playing in Paris at the Eiffel Tower and I have no one to tell." I was by myself at the time. And it was such a great feeling. It's like, all the way from Alabama to the top of the Eiffel Tower. Hearing my song, it was just a tremendous feeling.
Doug Burke:
I imagine getting your first royalty check might have been meaningful.
Roger Murrah:
Yeah.
Doug Burke:
Do you remember that?
Roger Murrah:
I'll tell you. The one I recall them ... I do recall my first BMI, and it was very, very low. But when I was building my first house, I was short on money. And my brother was there helping. And I got a check in the mail. I think it may have been $40,000 or something, man. And it was just wow, it just threw me to death. And my brother thought every check I got was like that, but not so much. But the timing on it was just right to help me finish the house. But there was something I was about to say, I can't remember what it was.
Doug Burke:
The royalty check, your first-
Roger Murrah:
Oh, yeah. I wanted to tell you that I sang tenor with Bobby Bare at the Grand Ole Opry on the last Friday night at the Ryman. Now the very last one at the Ryman was Saturday night, but I sang harmony on Friday night. I ended up getting a check. And I think it was about $15 or something like that. And I told somebody, "I should frame this. If I didn't need the money I would." But I needed money. I'm sure it was to buy groceries.
Doug Burke:
You remember the song you sang there?
Roger Murrah:
Yeah, it was a song called Marie Laveau. Shel Silverstein wrote that, and I sang the tenor on record. So Bobby asked me to go out to the opera. And that was a big thrill for me.
Doug Burke:
You didn't write anything with Shel, right?
Roger Murrah:
No, I didn't. But he came to see me one time as a publisher. I was in publishing at the time. And he came to talk to me about possibly representing his catalog, which would just been unbelievable to have done but it didn't work out. But while he was there, of course, as you know, he was a cartoonist for Playboy Magazine. And I asked him one time if he ever gave his sketches to anybody and I don't know that he ever answered me really. But as he sat there, I had a book of his called The Giving Tree, which he also wrote children's books as well. When our visit was over. He had drawn my name carved in a tree, and everything in this book. It was the most amazing thing. I still have it. It's unbelievable. A drawing by Shel Silverstein.
Doug Burke:
So 1986 was a very good year for you. You had two number one's; Hearts Aren't Made to Break (They're Made to Love) by Lee Greenwood. On the Streamline album and Life's Highway by Steve Wariner on Life's Highway. You want to talk about the songs, Hearts Aren't Made to Break?
Roger Murrah:
Hearts Aren't Made to Break (They're Made to Love). I remember us taking that to Jerry Crutchfield, he was producing Lee at the time and I just remember being thrilled that he liked it. And Lee ended up liking it and they recorded it and I remember the first time I heard it. It sounded like it was slow. But after time went on, I realized the rhythm of it was just perfect for the song. What I remember the most is the gratitude I've felt through the years for all these things that have happened like that. I just loved having a Jerry Crutchfield production. I loved having a Lee Greenwood song sang, and us getting that song recorded by them. Life's Highway was the first and only song I believe I ever wrote. No, it was one of two songs, I wrote with Richard Leigh. Richard actually wrote my favorite line in that song. And that is, "Here's hoping you never go astray on life's highway." I believe it was something like that. But it's something close to that. I love that sentiment. Richard actually wrote that. And Richard was one of the best melody people ever. And I think we really collaborated a lot on that song, melodically and lyrically.
Doug Burke:
He wrote a lot of songs about breaking up.
Roger Murrah:
Yeah. Well, it's the angst in the song that really pulls that emotion. I've been told for the years that people could tell my songs by the sadness in them. A lot of them do have a sad stricken. And I think it's because of some things I went through as a young person. So I kind of wrote that out in my songs. But songwriting is cathartic, very much so and I never until recently have I realized the help songs and music have been to people around the world. We had a song that I've published, called I'm Movin' On, that Philip White co-wrote.
You said he came to-
Doug Burke:
He actually spoke to us about that song. It's on the podcast.
Roger Murrah:
We actually got mail on that. And I'm sure he may have told you about it. He got one letter for sure that the person said they we're close to committing suicide and heard that song, and it saved their life, really.
Roger Murrah:
Did he tell you about getting stabbed with the award on a song?
Doug Burke:
No, he didn't.
Roger Murrah:
Okay, he got an Academy of Country Music Award on, it may have been I'm Movin' On. I can't remember. But he said he worked all of his career and all of a sudden he's on television and receives this Academy of Country Music Award. And it has a hat on the award with real pointed sides and he ended up stabbing his hand with it. He said he was bleeding from that award, but Philip was a special writer, I enjoyed working with him.
Doug Burke:
So perhaps my favorite song is Don't Rock the Jukebox.
Roger Murrah:
Really?
Doug Burke:
Just because it's a-
Roger Murrah:
I didn't know you were a country fan.
Doug Burke:
It's so danceable, and I'm an Alan Jackson fan. And Alan's talked a lot about that song, where that came from.
Roger Murrah:
Yeah.
Doug Burke:
But you co-wrote it with him and Keith. And you were one of I think, Alan's go-to guys.
Roger Murrah:
Well, at that time, yeah. Me and Jim McBride. Jim, and he wrote a lot of stuff together, great stuff. But I'll tell you about somebody I've been asked before. A few times, actually, that did we feel like we had something when we wrote that song. And experienced writers do have a better inkling of that possibility than average Joe, I guess. But I said when we got Rolling Stone and George Jones rhyming, I said, "I knew I he had something special." But you know what? I always kind of basically gave it credit for being a DD I felt like is a DD, okay. But then I got to hear how many young people it brought into the fold of country music. They were coming in by the droves because of Don't Rock the Jukebox. But one of the smartest things I've seen an artist do was on when we were writing that song. Alan, as I've mentioned before, he was singing demos. That's what he was doing to make a living. And he hadn't made it yet. And of course, hadn't gotten a record deal. He'd gotten turned down by just about everybody in town. But he had the sensibility as a singer that he didn't want to turn anybody off with that song. So it was his idea for us to go, "I ain't got nothing against rock and roll, but when your heart's been broken, you need a song that's slow." That was Alan's idea. He wanted to keep the rock people in.
Doug Burke:
He wanted to pull across over audience-
Roger Murrah:
Yeah, exactly.
Doug Burke:
... which he did.
Roger Murrah:
Exactly.
Doug Burke:
He was successful in doing.
Roger Murrah:
Exactly. He just wanted to be sure, but it was taken care of. And I thought that was ingenious for him at that point in his career. He didn't really have a career actually, for him to know that. But he knew he's going to be singing it. If it's a hit, he's going to sing it forever. So I just thought that was ingenious, really.
Doug Burke:
This notion of country versus rock, which to me, it feels like it's a little more created by the country crowd than the rock crowd. But I could be wrong on that because you had Bob Dylan come to Nashville in the mid '70s. And the reason he did was because the musicians, the session musicians he likes better than the guys he was playing within Greenwich Village.
Roger Murrah:
Yeah.
Doug Burke:
And so he said, "Let's go to Nashville where the guys know how to play session music." I guess and not to offend the other guys.
Roger Murrah:
Yeah, that album with Skyline.
Doug Burke:
Nashville Skyline. Well, that was subsequent to actually him recording with session musicians here, that's when he fell in love with Nashville.
Roger Murrah:
Okay. Well, you know what? You make a very legitimate point. Country music, it was carved out of a very difficult, painful poor people past, okay. They were very proud of that. With all due respect to everybody, sometimes when there's a lack of education, there's a lack of ... What do you call it? Sharing of things. It's like, I don't know, this is my baby, don't mess with it. And so it comes from traditional music. And they were very protective of it. They didn't want anybody damaging it with harsh guitar sounds and things like that. That's why the opera was so slow to add drums and add other instruments. But it just comes from a hardcore background, it's what it is. But as musicians came together, we had to learn how to share these things that we all love so much. And the fusion of it all is where it's at, really, it really is where it's at. Nobody loves traditional country music more than me. But I also realized that music evolves, it evolves, it's always changing. Whether we like it or not, it's always changing. You can be hardcore and stuck in the tradition, or you can grow with it. It's up to you. So I'm not one of those old-timers that put down what's going on with the young people. I think they're doing their best with it and some of them are making some amazing music, some of them aren't. But that was true of traditional people as well. Some people made great music, some people didn't make so great music. But I think it would be the countryside of things that were protecting their-
Doug Burke:
George Jones of the world.
Roger Murrah:
Yeah, they were very proud of that.
Doug Burke:
Their treasures.
Roger Murrah:
Exactly. Don't mess with our treasure.
Doug Burke:
He was a character and a half to say the least.
Roger Murrah:
He was and someone I never did a recording by him.
Doug Burke:
Did you try?
Roger Murrah:
Yeah, we've pitched him some things but-
Doug Burke:
He didn't buy-in?
Roger Murrah:
... it wouldn't work.
Doug Burke:
I believe it's your last number one in 1995 was by Clay Walker, If I Could Make a Living.
Roger Murrah:
Mm-hmm.
Doug Burke:
And you wrote that with Keith Stegall and Alan Jackson.
Roger Murrah:
Exactly.
Doug Burke:
And I was wondering like why did Alan pass on that and give it to Clay?
Roger Murrah:
Well, you know what? I don't even know if Alan remembered the song because it was the most perfect Alan Jackson song there was. And for some reason, he just never did get around to recording it. But luckily, we were very fortunate in that he still was producing Clay Walker. And so he cut it on Clay and Clay went to number one with it. But I always wonder, "Why in the world did Alan cut that song?" I bet he wishes he had after Clay took it to number one, so I don't know. But it worked out okay.
Doug Burke:
So this is one of your love songs. I really love your love songs, if I may say so. What do you look for when you're trying to write a love song like this? It's a beautiful love song. If I Could Make a Living out of loving you.
Roger Murrah:
Yeah, those lines they just fell pretty quickly, pretty easily. And we were just having fun with it. And it was very positive toward the woman, which it must be, it has to be in songwriting. But it's bouncy, it's fun and it's very positive toward her. And I don't know what to say, really. Maybe you should ask me about lines rather than the song. I don't know.
Doug Burke:
I could work all day and feel right at home loving that 8:00 to 5:00.
Roger Murrah:
Well, it's like with her he could get along well in the world.
Doug Burke:
I was wondering if you draw any personal inspiration from loves when you write the songs? Or do you completely separate that part of your life out and you have this whole imaginary place you go to when you write songs?
Roger Murrah:
Yeah. I'll tell you what I borrow from real-life are the emotions. And I'll take them over here in this imaginary world and swap them around, and use them on different things. But the emotion is real. That's an odd thing. But that's the way I work.
Doug Burke:
Because I always thought that guys like you would write a song like this and take it home to the girl that they loved or after and say, "What do you think. You inspired me to write this. What do you think?" And did you ever do that? Or never did that?
Roger Murrah:
There are songs that I would take my wife to get her opinion on. But she was quite the critic. And I didn't get away with anything with her but she was much quicker to criticize than encourage, unfortunately. And so I was very reluctant, it just depended. But my background with love. It's not really something you would write songs about, it's not that interesting. The angst of it all, I was pretty good at that. It has to be there.
Doug Burke:
So Blake Shelton, recorded a top 10 hit for you.
Roger Murrah:
Yeah, my buddy. He used to hang out at the office and listen to songs. And I didn't know this but he took a copy of Goodbye Time with him one day. And in Blake's mind, "One of these days I'm going to record this."
Roger Murrah:
Now, most people would not cover a Conway Twitty cut. It's like most people wouldn't record an Elvis Presley cut, something Elvis had done. But Blake didn't care. That's Blake for you. And so we ended up with two top-five or top 10 records on that song because of Blake. But he was just hanging out at the office listening to songs. That's what he was doing. He loves songs.
Doug Burke:
And co-wrote that with James Dean Hicks.
Roger Murrah:
Mm-hmm.
Doug Burke:
He said that was about his brother's divorce.
Roger Murrah:
Yeah, that's what he told me that later.
Doug Burke:
Later. But in the session, he didn't tell you that.
Roger Murrah:
Well, yeah. I think he did talk about that. But I'm sure James Dean as well has received some of the best compliments about that song because it doesn't have a lot of lyric in it. It's very, very compact lyrically. But the melody is spot on for what it's saying. And Conway just loved it. There was a line in there that Conway wanted to change. I said, "Please don't change." Usually, you kind of went with artists when they wanted to change something. But actually, I've only had that happen three times.
Doug Burke:
You remember each one?
Roger Murrah:
Yeah, I do. That line was ... What's the line in there about me? The first verse.
Doug Burke:
It's your life. You say you need to change, don't all the dreams we've seen come true mean anything. You say it's different now and you keep staring at the door. How can you walk away? Don't I matter anymore?
Roger Murrah:
That's the line, "Don't I matter anymore." Conway thought it was too self-serving for the singer, but it's the opposite. Don't I matter anymore? That's the most longing sadness. And I'm so glad he didn't change it. He was just concerned about it being a little to me, me. But he went with me on it. He took my word for it. Yup.
Doug Burke:
He kept it.
Roger Murrah:
Yeah.
Doug Burke:
And then the other two cases, did they keep it when you fought for it?
Roger Murrah:
Oh, no. Okay, Alabama. In the chorus on High Cotton, the original line was a little too poetic. And Randy Owen knew his audience so well. The line was too, what we call heady, too poetic. That line, "Leaving home was the hardest thing we ever faced." Okay, that originally left leaving home was the hardest crop we ever raised. Talking about the children. And Randy said it is not easy enough to grasp. So what I learned from that though, you can change a line, but the song doesn't have to suffer. Because you come up with a line that you feel good about. That they feel good about, as well. That's exactly what we did. And the song's better because of that, it's really is, and it's because of Randy.
Doug Burke:
I think in Goodbye Time, that notion that don’t I matter anymore? You hear that a lot from people who go through a divorce. I felt like I didn't matter anymore. "Why did you break up?" "I felt like I didn't matter anymore."
Roger Murrah:
Yeah, exactly.
Doug Burke:
That's kind of a lonely feeling, to say the least.
Roger Murrah:
Exactly. And that was why it was so important to me that he'd keep it. "Don't you care about me anymore? What about me?
Doug Burke:
Well, the song that I really love that you wrote for the Oak Ridge Boys in that elk is the Ozark Mountain Jubilee.
Roger Murrah:
Oh, thank you, man.
Doug Burke:
I love that song.
Roger Murrah:
Oh, I can't believe we haven't talked about that song.
Doug Burke:
We need to talk about this song.
Roger Murrah:
Oh, please, yes. Okay, I can remember sitting in our first house. And that song, when I'm forced to pick my favorite, that's what I had to pick. Because the song has parallel stories going on in it. One is, he leaves home to chase his dream, like boys do like girls do as well. And then they circle back and come back home and find out, what they're looking for was right there at home. And in this case, he leaves home and goes comes back, also to die, to be buried. That's going on in that song all along. When we first started writing the song, we'd get to that Missouri line. We wanted to have it somewhere other than the South, we wanted it to be something different. And so that's why we went to Missouri. We had a geography book sitting on the table. And we just looked up, and we found The San Francisco Silver Dollar Line in this geography book. And come to find out later, it was actually a parked train that they called the-
Doug Burke:
The Frisco Silver Dollar Line.
Roger Murrah:
Yeah.
Doug Burke:
Was what they converted it to a restaurant or something. It was a diner?
Roger Murrah:
I don't know, but-
Doug Burke:
In a parked train, it didn't move.
Roger Murrah:
But that's where that name came from. And early on Jared Crutchfield, and we tried to get it to Glen Campbell. For some reason, I thought Glen would be perfect for it. Well, one reason because he's from the Ozarks. He is from Arkansas. But that didn't work out. But William Lee of course sang that. And he sings it in every show now. And William Lee, of course, is from Alabama like me. Well, he identified with that song somehow. But we've had amazing comments from people on that song. It's just been a real winner for us. And I couldn't be happier with how it all came out. And when we started writing the song, we didn't know what the title was. So we'd get all the way down through the course, and that Ozark Mountain Jubilee was the phrasing that needed to fit that line. Jubilee actually comes from the Bible, from the early ... The Jubilee they talk about was one of the feast days and just that sound of Jubilee. And then hearing that through the years through hymns and things like that. That's where that came from.
Doug Burke:
The line in there that grabs my attention, "If I can't be a favorite son, I'll be the prodigal one." What does that mean?
Roger Murrah:
Of course, the prodigal son is a story in the Bible. Or the point we were making was if I can't be something special, I'll be the one that's not so special, okay? If I can't be your favorite son, I'll be your prodigal one. That's talking to the people of his state, the people of his home, the people of his growing up. If I can't be something special to you, let me be the one that's not so special. That's really what that's about. But it's taken right out of the Bible, the idea of it.
Doug Burke:
It echoed for me Creedence Clearwater Revival's music with John Fogerty's lyrics there.
Roger Murrah:
Yeah.
Doug Burke:
But obviously the Bible-
Roger Murrah:
And the band too.
Doug Burke:
And the band. Yes.
Roger Murrah:
Yeah, having a song that anywhere close to either one of those just means the world to me. But that's the origin of it.
Doug Burke:
I love this song. I think it's just-
Roger Murrah:
Thank you very much.
Doug Burke:
... beautiful.
Roger Murrah:
The only dream music-related that I have had that hasn't come true, is I want to do a songwriter album. I'm still hoping to do that and Ozark Mountain Jubilee will certainly be one of the songs.
Doug Burke:
What does the songwriter album mean?
Roger Murrah:
Well, it just means a songwriter singing his own songs.
Doug Burke:
Okay, as opposed to pitching them for someone else?
Roger Murrah:
Yeah. I actually have got in this business to sing.
Doug Burke:
You did. You wanted to be a-
Roger Murrah:
I wanted to be a singer, yeah. But the writing took off. I didn't have the time to devote to being an artist that you have to have, but it worked out for the best. I wouldn't want to go on the road. I wouldn't want to do what they had to do. But I've always sung my own demos and things like that.
Doug Burke:
I obviously interview a lot of songwriters and many of them start thinking that they'll-
Roger Murrah:
Sure.
Doug Burke:
... be the performer and that I think the vast majority realize the road is a rougher place than you think.
Roger Murrah:
Exactly. It's tough.
Doug Burke:
A lot of hours on a bus or in a car as opposed to performing.
Roger Murrah:
Yeah.
Doug Burke:
You have days where you got to put the smiley face on and get out there and put the show on when you're not-
Roger Murrah:
The show must go on.
Doug Burke:
... maybe in the best mood, or feeling 100%.
Roger Murrah:
Yeah, it's unbelievable what artists give up. It cost them a lot man. It cost them a lot.
Doug Burke:
And so in many respects, being the writer who gets to stay home while they sell your songs is not the worst thing-
Roger Murrah:
No, it's actually the best job in town.
Doug Burke:
Well, I hope we can get one of your other songs recorded by someone contemporary as part of this, that would really throw me if you-
