{"id":1310853,"date":"2019-05-30T23:00:13","date_gmt":"2019-05-31T05:00:13","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.cmt.com\/news\/?p=1807069"},"modified":"2019-05-30T23:00:13","modified_gmt":"2019-05-31T05:00:13","slug":"a-fond-flashback-at-johnny-paycheck-icon-and-ex-con","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/alwaysmountaintime.com\/kske\/music-news\/a-fond-flashback-at-johnny-paycheck-icon-and-ex-con\/","title":{"rendered":"A Fond Flashback at Johnny Paycheck, Icon and Ex-con"},"content":{"rendered":"<p><span class=\"byline\">by <span class=\"author\"><a href=\"http:\/\/www.cmt.com\/news\/author\/morrise\/\" title=\"Posts by Edward Morris\" rel=\"author\">Edward Morris<\/a><\/span> <span class=\"date\">13m ago<\/span><\/span> <\/p>\n<div class=\"deferred_content\">Embedded from <a href=\"https:\/\/www.youtube.com\/embed\/I8sQNuUXBNw?feature=oembed\">www.youtube.com<\/a>. <noscript class=\"deferred_content\" data-deferred-info=\"{&quot;type&quot;:&quot;iframe&quot;}\"><\/p>\n<p><iframe loading=\"lazy\" width=\"500\" height=\"375\" src=\"https:\/\/www.youtube.com\/embed\/I8sQNuUXBNw?feature=oembed\" frameborder=\"0\" allow=\"accelerometer; autoplay; encrypted-media; gyroscope; picture-in-picture\" allowfullscreen=\"allowfullscreen\">[embedded content]<\/iframe><\/p>\n<p><\/noscript><\/div>\n<p>Had he lived, Donald Eugene Lytle, a.k.a. <a href=\"http:\/\/www.cmt.com\/artists\/johnny-paycheck\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\" target=\"_blank\">Johnny Paycheck<\/a>, would have been celebrating his 81st birthday Friday (May 31).<\/p>\n<p>Known first and foremost for his only No. 1 hit, the 1977 \u201cTake This Job and Shove It,\u201d Paycheck played in bands for George Jones, Porter Wagoner, Faron Young and Ray Price before taking his stage name and signing a recording deal as a solo artist.<\/p>\n<p><strong>Johnny Paycheck Striking With Teamsters, 1977<\/strong><\/p>\n<div class=\"photo\" id=\"bc97b2d5\">\n<div class=\"deferred_content\"><noscript class=\"deferred_content\" data-deferred-info=\"{&quot;type&quot;:&quot;img&quot;}\"><\/p>\n<p><img decoding=\"async\" src=\"http:\/\/cmt.mtvnimages.com\/uri\/mgid:file:http:shared:cmt.com\/news\/uploads\/sites\/3\/2019\/05\/GettyImages-1805542-1559272579.jpg?quality=0.85&amp;format=jpg&amp;width=480\" srcset=\"http:\/\/cmt.mtvnimages.com\/uri\/mgid:file:http:shared:cmt.com\/news\/uploads\/sites\/3\/2019\/05\/GettyImages-1805542-1559272579.jpg?quality=0.8&amp;format=jpg&amp;width=481 481w, http:\/\/cmt.mtvnimages.com\/uri\/mgid:file:http:shared:cmt.com\/news\/uploads\/sites\/3\/2019\/05\/GettyImages-1805542-1559272579.jpg?quality=0.8&amp;format=jpg&amp;width=660 660w, http:\/\/cmt.mtvnimages.com\/uri\/mgid:file:http:shared:cmt.com\/news\/uploads\/sites\/3\/2019\/05\/GettyImages-1805542-1559272579.jpg?quality=0.8&amp;format=jpg&amp;width=768 768w, http:\/\/cmt.mtvnimages.com\/uri\/mgid:file:http:shared:cmt.com\/news\/uploads\/sites\/3\/2019\/05\/GettyImages-1805542-1559272579.jpg?quality=0.8&amp;format=jpg&amp;width=980 980w, http:\/\/cmt.mtvnimages.com\/uri\/mgid:file:http:shared:cmt.com\/news\/uploads\/sites\/3\/2019\/05\/GettyImages-1805542-1559272579.jpg?quality=0.8&amp;format=jpg&amp;width=1200 1200w, http:\/\/cmt.mtvnimages.com\/uri\/mgid:file:http:shared:cmt.com\/news\/uploads\/sites\/3\/2019\/05\/GettyImages-1805542-1559272579.jpg?quality=0.8&amp;format=jpg&amp;width=1500 1500w, http:\/\/cmt.mtvnimages.com\/uri\/mgid:file:http:shared:cmt.com\/news\/uploads\/sites\/3\/2019\/05\/GettyImages-1805542-1559272579.jpg?quality=0.8&amp;format=jpg&amp;width=1800 1800w\" title=\"Johnny Paycheck Striking With Teamsters, 1977.\" class=\"js-srcset-img shortcode-image\" alt><\/p>\n<p><\/noscript><\/div>\n<div class=\"photocredit\">Hulton Archive\/Getty Images<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<p><strong>Paycheck &amp; Merle Haggard At Countryside Opry<\/strong><\/p>\n<div class=\"photo\" id=\"ccfd465a\">\n<div class=\"deferred_content\"><noscript class=\"deferred_content\" data-deferred-info=\"{&quot;type&quot;:&quot;img&quot;}\"><\/p>\n<p><img decoding=\"async\" src=\"http:\/\/cmt.mtvnimages.com\/uri\/mgid:file:http:shared:cmt.com\/news\/uploads\/sites\/3\/2019\/05\/GettyImages-158497856-1559272488.jpg?quality=0.85&amp;format=jpg&amp;width=480\" srcset=\"http:\/\/cmt.mtvnimages.com\/uri\/mgid:file:http:shared:cmt.com\/news\/uploads\/sites\/3\/2019\/05\/GettyImages-158497856-1559272488.jpg?quality=0.8&amp;format=jpg&amp;width=481 481w, http:\/\/cmt.mtvnimages.com\/uri\/mgid:file:http:shared:cmt.com\/news\/uploads\/sites\/3\/2019\/05\/GettyImages-158497856-1559272488.jpg?quality=0.8&amp;format=jpg&amp;width=660 660w, http:\/\/cmt.mtvnimages.com\/uri\/mgid:file:http:shared:cmt.com\/news\/uploads\/sites\/3\/2019\/05\/GettyImages-158497856-1559272488.jpg?quality=0.8&amp;format=jpg&amp;width=768 768w, http:\/\/cmt.mtvnimages.com\/uri\/mgid:file:http:shared:cmt.com\/news\/uploads\/sites\/3\/2019\/05\/GettyImages-158497856-1559272488.jpg?quality=0.8&amp;format=jpg&amp;width=980 980w, http:\/\/cmt.mtvnimages.com\/uri\/mgid:file:http:shared:cmt.com\/news\/uploads\/sites\/3\/2019\/05\/GettyImages-158497856-1559272488.jpg?quality=0.8&amp;format=jpg&amp;width=1200 1200w, http:\/\/cmt.mtvnimages.com\/uri\/mgid:file:http:shared:cmt.com\/news\/uploads\/sites\/3\/2019\/05\/GettyImages-158497856-1559272488.jpg?quality=0.8&amp;format=jpg&amp;width=1500 1500w, http:\/\/cmt.mtvnimages.com\/uri\/mgid:file:http:shared:cmt.com\/news\/uploads\/sites\/3\/2019\/05\/GettyImages-158497856-1559272488.jpg?quality=0.8&amp;format=jpg&amp;width=1800 1800w\" title=\"Paycheck &amp; Haggard At Countryside Opry\" class=\"js-srcset-img shortcode-image\" alt><\/p>\n<p><\/noscript><\/div>\n<div class=\"photocredit\">Kirk West\/Getty Images<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<p>In a recording career that lasted from 1965 to 1989, when he went to prison for 22 months for shooting a man in a bar fight, Paycheck charted 60 singles, including the Top 5 \u201cShe\u2019s All I Got\u201d and \u201cSomeone to Give My Love To\u201d and the Top 10 \u201cSlide Off of Your Satin Sheets\u201d and \u201cI\u2019m the Only Hell My Mama Ever Raised.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>Paycheck was inducted into the Grand Ole Opry in 1997.<\/p>\n<div class=\"photo\" id=\"cb908243\">\n<div class=\"deferred_content\"><noscript class=\"deferred_content\" data-deferred-info=\"{&quot;type&quot;:&quot;img&quot;}\"><\/p>\n<p><img decoding=\"async\" src=\"http:\/\/cmt.mtvnimages.com\/uri\/mgid:file:http:shared:cmt.com\/news\/uploads\/sites\/3\/2019\/05\/GettyImages-609941116-1559272595.jpg?quality=0.85&amp;format=jpg&amp;width=480\" srcset=\"http:\/\/cmt.mtvnimages.com\/uri\/mgid:file:http:shared:cmt.com\/news\/uploads\/sites\/3\/2019\/05\/GettyImages-609941116-1559272595.jpg?quality=0.8&amp;format=jpg&amp;width=481 481w, http:\/\/cmt.mtvnimages.com\/uri\/mgid:file:http:shared:cmt.com\/news\/uploads\/sites\/3\/2019\/05\/GettyImages-609941116-1559272595.jpg?quality=0.8&amp;format=jpg&amp;width=660 660w, http:\/\/cmt.mtvnimages.com\/uri\/mgid:file:http:shared:cmt.com\/news\/uploads\/sites\/3\/2019\/05\/GettyImages-609941116-1559272595.jpg?quality=0.8&amp;format=jpg&amp;width=768 768w, http:\/\/cmt.mtvnimages.com\/uri\/mgid:file:http:shared:cmt.com\/news\/uploads\/sites\/3\/2019\/05\/GettyImages-609941116-1559272595.jpg?quality=0.8&amp;format=jpg&amp;width=980 980w, http:\/\/cmt.mtvnimages.com\/uri\/mgid:file:http:shared:cmt.com\/news\/uploads\/sites\/3\/2019\/05\/GettyImages-609941116-1559272595.jpg?quality=0.8&amp;format=jpg&amp;width=1200 1200w, http:\/\/cmt.mtvnimages.com\/uri\/mgid:file:http:shared:cmt.com\/news\/uploads\/sites\/3\/2019\/05\/GettyImages-609941116-1559272595.jpg?quality=0.8&amp;format=jpg&amp;width=1500 1500w, http:\/\/cmt.mtvnimages.com\/uri\/mgid:file:http:shared:cmt.com\/news\/uploads\/sites\/3\/2019\/05\/GettyImages-609941116-1559272595.jpg?quality=0.8&amp;format=jpg&amp;width=1800 1800w\" title=\"ABC's Coverage of the American Music Awards - Archive\" class=\"js-srcset-img shortcode-image\" alt><\/p>\n<p><\/noscript><\/div>\n<div class=\"photocredit\">ABC Photo Archives\/ABC via Getty Images<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<p>I did not know Paycheck, but I was one of the reporters invited to George Jones\u2019 house for a press conference soon after Paycheck was released from jail in 1991. Here\u2019s my account of that encounter:<\/p>\n<p><strong>Johnny Paycheck Returns, Humbler and Smarter<\/strong><\/p>\n<p>Broke but buoyant, Johnny Paycheck perched himself on a high stool in the middle of George Jones\u2019 Brentwood, Tenn. living room and genially bade the encircling reporters to start pecking. This was not the cadaverous and combative Paycheck of old, the feisty yeast of a thousand swollen tabloid stories. Just hours out of jail, here sat a man reborn \u2014 a virtual hymn to rehabilitation. \u201cI learned that [prison\u2019s] a terrible place to have to go,\u201d he said, \u201cbut it can sure get your priorities straight.\u201d<\/p>\n<div class=\"photo\" id=\"22f32776\">\n<div class=\"deferred_content\"><noscript class=\"deferred_content\" data-deferred-info=\"{&quot;type&quot;:&quot;img&quot;}\"><\/p>\n<p><img decoding=\"async\" src=\"http:\/\/cmt.mtvnimages.com\/uri\/mgid:file:http:shared:cmt.com\/news\/uploads\/sites\/3\/2019\/05\/GettyImages-158499068-1559272554.jpg?quality=0.85&amp;format=jpg&amp;width=480\" srcset=\"http:\/\/cmt.mtvnimages.com\/uri\/mgid:file:http:shared:cmt.com\/news\/uploads\/sites\/3\/2019\/05\/GettyImages-158499068-1559272554.jpg?quality=0.8&amp;format=jpg&amp;width=481 481w, http:\/\/cmt.mtvnimages.com\/uri\/mgid:file:http:shared:cmt.com\/news\/uploads\/sites\/3\/2019\/05\/GettyImages-158499068-1559272554.jpg?quality=0.8&amp;format=jpg&amp;width=660 660w, http:\/\/cmt.mtvnimages.com\/uri\/mgid:file:http:shared:cmt.com\/news\/uploads\/sites\/3\/2019\/05\/GettyImages-158499068-1559272554.jpg?quality=0.8&amp;format=jpg&amp;width=768 768w, http:\/\/cmt.mtvnimages.com\/uri\/mgid:file:http:shared:cmt.com\/news\/uploads\/sites\/3\/2019\/05\/GettyImages-158499068-1559272554.jpg?quality=0.8&amp;format=jpg&amp;width=980 980w, http:\/\/cmt.mtvnimages.com\/uri\/mgid:file:http:shared:cmt.com\/news\/uploads\/sites\/3\/2019\/05\/GettyImages-158499068-1559272554.jpg?quality=0.8&amp;format=jpg&amp;width=1200 1200w, http:\/\/cmt.mtvnimages.com\/uri\/mgid:file:http:shared:cmt.com\/news\/uploads\/sites\/3\/2019\/05\/GettyImages-158499068-1559272554.jpg?quality=0.8&amp;format=jpg&amp;width=1500 1500w, http:\/\/cmt.mtvnimages.com\/uri\/mgid:file:http:shared:cmt.com\/news\/uploads\/sites\/3\/2019\/05\/GettyImages-158499068-1559272554.jpg?quality=0.8&amp;format=jpg&amp;width=1800 1800w\" title=\"Johnny Paycheck At Holiday Star\" class=\"js-srcset-img shortcode-image portrait\" alt><\/p>\n<p><\/noscript><\/div>\n<\/p><\/div>\n<p>One of his priorities, it developed, was completing his high-school education, an enterprise he had originally abandoned about the time he reached the eighth grade. \u201cI learned a lot about the educational system, and what not having it does to you,\u201d he explained. He said he spent part of his time in prison working as a teacher\u2019s aide. By the time he entered prison, he added, he had given up drugs and drinking. Inside, he gave up smoking and was evidently rewarded for his abstemiousness with a respectable paunch.<\/p>\n<p>Did his celebrity status make life within the walls easier for him, a reporter wanted to know. \u201cI didn\u2019t try to be anything but an inmate,\u201d said the singer, \u201cbut still most of them called me \u2018Mr. Paycheck.\u2019 \u2026 I signed more autographs in there than I did out here for a while.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>Paycheck said he had a radio and TV in his cell and was able to keep up with what was happening in country music: \u201cA lot of great new talent came along while I was in there,\u201d observed the man who regaled an earlier generation with such memorables as \u201cShe\u2019s All I\u2019ve Got,\u201d \u201cSlide Off Of Your Satin Sheets,\u201d \u201cI\u2019m the Only Hell My Mama Ever Raised\u201d and that eternal cry of freedom, \u201cTake This Job And Shove It.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>Since exiting the Bastille, he said, he\u2019s formed a band, found a booker and is ready to take to the road again. He\u2019d also just recorded a single with Jones, he said, called, \u201cThe Last Outlaw Is Alive and Doing Well.\u201d No record deal yet, but he\u2019s busy shopping for one.<\/p>\n<p>While Paycheck fielded questions, his old buddies Jones, Waylon Jennings, Tom T. Hall and David Allan Coe stood with their backs to the wall, radiating support and affection.<\/p>\n<p>Never a model of fiscal prudence, the 52-year-old Paycheck admitted that his prison stay had left him tapped out again: \u201cI don\u2019t have anything right now,\u201d he reported \u2014 without a hint of despair or self-pity. \u201cI\u2019m starting over again. I have to start over from the bottom, and that\u2019s fine with me.\u201d<\/p>\n<div class=\"author\">\n<div class=\"description\">Edward Morris is a veteran of country music journalism. He lives in Nashville, Tennessee, and is a frequent contributor to CMT.com.<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<p><a href=\"http:\/\/www.cmt.com\/news\/1807069\/a-fond-flashback-at-johnny-paycheck-icon-and-ex-con\/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">via:: CMT News<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>by Edward Morris 13m ago Embedded from www.youtube.com. [embedded content] Had he lived, Donald Eugene Lytle, a.k.a. Johnny Paycheck, would have been celebrating his 81st birthday Friday (May 31). Known first and foremost for his only No. 1 hit, the 1977 \u201cTake This Job and Shove It,\u201d Paycheck played in bands for George Jones, Porter [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[159],"tags":[],"class_list":{"0":"post-1310853","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","6":"category-music-news"},"acf":[],"publishpress_future_action":{"enabled":false,"date":"2026-06-12 15:20:02","action":"change-status","newStatus":"draft","terms":[],"taxonomy":"category","extraData":[]},"publishpress_future_workflow_manual_trigger":{"enabledWorkflows":[]},"distributor_meta":false,"distributor_terms":false,"distributor_media":false,"distributor_original_site_name":"KSKE Ski Country","distributor_original_site_url":"https:\/\/alwaysmountaintime.com\/kske","push-errors":false,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/alwaysmountaintime.com\/kske\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1310853","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/alwaysmountaintime.com\/kske\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/alwaysmountaintime.com\/kske\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/alwaysmountaintime.com\/kske\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/alwaysmountaintime.com\/kske\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=1310853"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/alwaysmountaintime.com\/kske\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1310853\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/alwaysmountaintime.com\/kske\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=1310853"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/alwaysmountaintime.com\/kske\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=1310853"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/alwaysmountaintime.com\/kske\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=1310853"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}