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Good God, Buck Owens Was An Asshole!
If you read his new biography, you'll think so too.
Young Buck: Shortly after this photo was taken, Owens slept with four women and stiffed his band.
Oh, yay! It’s another edition of Fake Can Be Just As Good, wherein we read a newly released music bio and give you the highlights so you can fake your way through a conversation about it or impress dinner guests or what have you. This week we’re taking a peek inside Buck Owens: The Biography, by Eileen Sisk, and it’s quite a meaty slab (400 pages), exposing for bare the best-selling, prolific country artist who could never quite overcome the hillbilly bumpkin image he forged on Hee Haw. Buck Owens, while infinitely engaging and smartly articulated, is a juicy tell-all dripping with tabloid-style sensationalism, and peppered with contemporary colloquialisms like “sextracirricular activities.” As a result, it’s cheapened in parts, but there’s no doubt Sisk knows her subject: you damn near need a pen and paper to jot down notes to keep up. She does an excellent job of presenting her subject as a callous asshole, and while such a strategy shows her commitment to honest reporting, it will undoubtedly polarize both her readership and fans of the dearly departed country icon. Here’s the Buck Owens tale of the tape.
*Owens was born Alvis Edgar Owens Jr., weighing five pounds at birth and possessing only one functioning kidney.
*Buck was a nickname Owens adopted for himself when, at the age of 2, he insisted on sharing a moniker with the family mule.
*Buck had “emotional incest” with his mother, according to the national promotion director of Buck Owens Enterprises, and as a child often tried to protect her from the abuse of her husband.
*Owens had “brain fever” (which might have been meningitis) around the age of 10; when he was released from the hospital, he couldn’t remember the ABCs.
*Buck possessed perfect pitch. His mother Macie would play a game that consisted of her playing a note on the piano and Buck identifying it.
*The country singer started smoking and engaging in sexual activity at the age of 13.
*Much of the story of Buck Owens’ early years may have been fabricated. He provided his record label with biographical information that was later discredited by his own mother.
*Buck’s first child was born in 1946, when the musician was only 16.
*Owens married for a second time at age 18, to a yodeler named Bonnie who bore him two children. They divorced a few years after, and then reunited as band mates. Bonnie later married Merle Haggard, who was one of Buck’s major musical rivals.
*Buck started his professional career as a guitarist at The Blackboard in Bakersfield, Calif. The owners of the club either asked or forced him to take over singing when Billy Mize quit the house band, the Orange Blossom Playboys.
*According to Buck’s manager Jack McFadden, Owens was married at least seven times, though Buck himself has only ever verified three of those marriages.
*In 1956, Buck released two songs under the pseudonym Corky Jones. The songs had a rockabilly feel, and Owens didn’t want to risk the repudiation of his country fans.
*After he moved to Washington state, Buck bought one-third of the radio station KAYE, and served as a disc jockey, media buyer and ad salesman.
*In Tacoma, Buck judged two talent contests, both won by Loretta Lynn, who had not yet begun singing professionally.
*Buck’s fiddle player (and later, guitarist) Don Rich joined the band in 1958; the young musician was only 16. He used fake IDs to get into most of the clubs where the band played. At 18, he used his fake to get married.
*When Don and Buck toured as a duo, they paid their backing musicians in bread, bologna and water.
*Dorothy Owens, Buck’s sister and the business manager of Buck Owens Enterprises, is an out-of-the-closet lesbian. Her nickname: “Uncle Dorothy.”
*Following the release of 1963’s “Act Naturally,” Buck had 15 consecutive No. 1 hits on the Billboard country chart.
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1. Jerry said... on Mar 22, 2011 at 04:15PM
“Jerry:
Looks like Buck was something else.
Bill”
2. Alex said... on Apr 25, 2011 at 01:34AM
“The book was a true wall thrower, attempts at cornpone down home-isms which rang really hollow. But it is pretty clear Owens was a tool.”
3. fiddler said... on Dec 11, 2011 at 02:50PM
“I guess you should never find out about your heroes. Very disappointing. One correction on page 223...it's "Kaw-Liga" not "Elijah."”
4. Anonymous said... on Feb 10, 2012 at 08:50PM
“yea but he wrote and sang 40 years of great music so what about his personal life is yours pure white”
5. Anonymous said... on Feb 19, 2012 at 05:07PM
“for all the negatives that are out there about the man and I have some things that pissed me off as well, he di do a lot of good in the community, he gave everyone in the band jobs somewhere in his empire when he quite touring, he gave donations to many organizations under different names. The asshole part is also true. He spoke bad about a band I was in playing locally and we were really not his kind of music but his comments were pretty bad. Then he could be the complete opposite. He saw my grandmother outside his window with a flat tire, he came out and changed it for her when he could have had one of his minions do it.”
6. Anonymous said... on Jun 12, 2012 at 10:22PM
“Biographies can be written about people, but it doesn't mean that everything that is written is gospel. That's why some of the biographies are UNAUTHORIZED, because the subject of the book didn't authorize for the author to write it. I can write bad things about my husband, but it doesn't mean it's true. So before you start burning the man (Buck) at the stake, take what you read with a grain of salt. I myself will continue to think that Buck was a good man with good music that I really enjoyed.”
7. anonymous said... on Jun 19, 2012 at 07:37PM
“I don't know where the author got her information, but she either had a lot of bad resources or just wanted to fabricate much of the stories for $$$. I am not a country music fan, but I do know that this icon had been blessed with many musical gifts. Let's not always look for the bad in a person, for surely we will find it in all of us.
”
8. Katrina said... on Jun 30, 2012 at 03:40PM
“I don't believe any of that hogwash that was written about Buck Owens. I have admired him since I was a kid and a teen in the 90's and now as an adult I admire him even more. Buck wasn't anything like what you wrote! Buck was a good man!”
9. Carl said... on Jul 8, 2012 at 07:40PM
“You're right Katrina. Buck was a talented entertainer and a good man. Why anyone would write such trash is beyond me.”
10. strawman said... on Sep 30, 2012 at 11:16PM
“I worked as a carpenter on Jack McFadden's home in Modesto. He told me that Buck was a real hound dog and screwed everything in sight. He was especially fond of the 'mile high club' and would try to screw every 'stewardess' on every flight.... Just sayin”
11. Anonymous said... on Oct 29, 2012 at 03:42PM
“Do not believe everything you read in this book. I have known the Owens family for almost 40 years and most of this is a lie...not all, but most of it. Eileen S. never even tried to interview anyone other than Buck at his place of business nor any of the current Buckaroos and when she interviewed with Buck, he did not see her as the author of his biography. So I think it is sour grapes on her part as well as sour grapes of most of the people she interviewed since she only interviewed disgruntled people. I know that huge portions of this are flat out lies.”
12. Sandy said... on Dec 13, 2012 at 12:18AM
“This story is so not true!!!!!!! I met Buck in the 50s and was his friend until the end-He was the sweetest most caring person in the world-I would love to meet this person-Must been someone that wanted Buck and he said no!There were women who would cut his tires because they wanted a date with him-Soooooooooo many stories I could tell you-”
13. Anonymous said... on Apr 7, 2013 at 12:35PM
“The first rule of research writing - always use footnotes. While Sisk utilizes numerous primary sources throughout her tabloid flavored offering, she does not alway cite her sources. This is most evident as she makes speculations about group orgies and even hints at homosexual relationships among band members based on word-of-mouth, third-hand sources that bare no name. True, there is a bibliography, but it fails to connect actual sources with their direct contributions. It is apparent that Sisk has an axe to grind with Buck Owens, focusing only on the negative aspects of his relationships and career. Revisionist historians love to find threads and pull at them, putting their new-age spin on history without taking the time to properly cite references. It is a contradictory piece of pulp!”
14. jack mccall said... on Apr 24, 2013 at 06:02PM
“I first met "buck" when he made an appearance at a small club in Bloomfield, New Mexico. The name of the club was the "Somewhere Club". It was located between Bloomfield and Farmington N.M. I was a fan of "Bucks" for a number of years. My friend Kkn & I were
”