It’s been almost a decade since we lost him. On December 16th, 2003, Gary Stewart, despondent over the death of the woman that he married when he was seventeen years old, committed suicide by shooting himself in the neck at the age of 59. His one-story Fort Pierce, Florida home was described as “modest” by the local newspaper. The one-time “King of the Honky Tonks” determined it was better to burn out that to fade away. He had been making that decision his entire life.
The man with the eccentric, vibrato-laden vocal style learned how to play piano and guitar as a teenager and went to Nashville in the mid-1960s. He got his first break when country star Stonewall Jackson cut the maudlin “Poor Red Georgia Dirt,” a number Stewart co-wrote in 1965. It peaked at #44 on the country charts. Stewart worked as a piano player for Charlie Pride’s band for a year and a half and wrote songs that were recorded by Cal Smith, Nat Stuckey, and Billy Walker. As a songwriter, he had his first Top Ten with Stuckey’s 1969’s “Sweet Thang and Cisco.” That Jerry Lee Lewis style fast paced country rocker, where a wild night on the town results in incarceration, sounds similar to the high energy numbers Stewart would release as a solo artist. In 1970, he penned “She Goes Walking Through My Mind,” a generic weeper that Billy Walker took to #3. While it was often said during Stewart’s career that he lacked the commercial sensibility required in Nashville, these successes as a songwriter belie that claim.
Stewart returned to Nashville in 1973 and cut a rather lackluster cover version of the Allman Brothers’ “Ramblin Man,” which went to #63 on the country charts. However, the man with the wild hair and equally wild voice was about to hit his artistic stride. “Drinkin’ Thing,” featuring a big chorus hook and padded with background singers, sounded like contemporary country music at the time. (It was penned by Wayne Carson, who also wrote “The Letter” and “Always on My Mind”). Stewart gave a relatively straightforward vocal performance and the song went to #10. He went straight from drinking to cheating, with the two timing “Out of Hand” going to #4 and giving Stewart an opportunity to show off his vocal chops. In those two songs, his die was caste. Bar rooms and heartbreak, loneliness and whiskey. George Jones sang about these classic country themes from the comfort of Nashville mansions. Gary Stewart worked the gritty Texas honky-tonk circuit.
Another Wayne Carson number became Stewart’s signature song. A lesser singer would have emphasized the wordplay of “She’s Actin’ Single (I’m Drinkin’ Doubles).” Stewart sang the tune like a man with a knife in his chest. In May of 1975, it became his first and only #1 hit. Gary and RCA were not ready to capitalize on this success. A weak single, “You’re Not the Woman You Used to Be,” was the title track of his next album and peaked at #15. The slide guitar hooked “Flat Natural Born Good-Timin’ Man,” was another step away from commercial norms and peaked at #20.
1977’s Your Place or Mine album was a more confident effort and the classic title track, with a lascivious nod to Jerry Lee’s mannerisms, went to #11. The followup single, “Ten Years of This,” makes a decade of marriage sound like a brutal eternity. Stewart had his last Top Twenty hit in 1978 with “Whiskey Trip,” a song that has elements of Jimmy Buffett’s beach and water vibe, yet is still imbued with sorrow. He never had another significant country hit. 1981’s “She’s Got a Drinkin’ Problem” was a strong as his mid-1970s best work, but radio programmers and audiences had moved on to the pseudo-country music of acts like Alabama. After two failed collaboration albums with Dean Dillon, Stewart was dropped from RCA.
At this point in the saga, I have failed to mention that Gary Stewart was not your standard issue Nashville factory line singer neither vocally or in attitude. He proudly and rather openly loved drugs. Cocaine, painkillers, and speed were just part of the diet. Check out 1981’s “Honky Tonk Man” on YouTube. It sounds like a man singing from the substance abuse section of a psychiatric ward.
In 1987 writer Jimmy McDonough went on a mission to find Stewart, which took him to Fort Pierce. The king of honky-tonk heartbreak was living in a trailer with the windows painted black. His sustenance was off-brand discount soda, Reese’s Peanut Butter Cups, and massive amounts of amphetamine. Overall, he was pretty happy. McDonough’s article and the resulting attention both inspired Stewart to record again and created interest in the unconventional singer. In 1999, Brand New was released on the High Tone label. As an album, it’s uneven, but “An Empty Glass” ranks with the greatest country drinking songs of all time. Think about that sentence for a second.
Stewart recorded two more albums in the 1990s and continued to tour. One of my former colleagues once recalled that the management staff at Billy Bob’s in Fort Worth, one of Gary’s regular stops, never failed to get upset when he left the stage to walk across the long customer tables while performing. His last official release was a live album from Billy Bob’s released in 2003, at a time when his once commanding voice had been considerable weakened by age and abuse.
Gary Stewart was an original. He wasn’t part of any movement or particularly interested in stardom. He sang traditional hard country music with extraordinary passion and emotional honesty. His art truly reflected his dreams and his excesses. At his best, nobody has ever been better.
Comments are closed.