By the early 1980s, George Jones‘ career had fallen into a slump, following his bouts of drug and alcohol addiction and his divorce from Tammy Wynette. He hadn’t had a No. 1 hit in six years, and his career was put into question, a result of his substance abuse and concert no-shows. Then, Jones stunned to industry with the release of his 1980 album, I Am What I Am, and what would become another one of his classics, “He Stopped Loving Her Today.”
Once released, the song shot to the top of the Country chart, where it remained for 18 weeks, and helped revive Jones’ career. Written for Jones by Bobby Braddock and Curly Putman, the song connected with Jones, who still loved Wynette and continued collaborating with her long after their divorce.
“He Stopped Loving Her Today” tells the story of a man who, after being left behind by his lover, vows to love her until the day he dies.
He said, “I’ll love you till I die”
She told him, “You’ll forget in time”
As the years went slowly by
She still preyed upon his mind
He kept her picture on his wall
Went half crazy now and then
But he still loved her through it all
Hoping she’d come back again
Kept some letters by his bed
Dated 1962
He had underlined in red
Every single, I love you
I went to see him just today
Oh, but I didn’t see no tears
All dressed up to go away
First time I’d seen him smile in years
Videos by American Songwriter
“Nobody’ll buy that morbid son of a b—ch.” —George Jones
At first, Jones disliked the song when he first heard it, and called it “morbid.”
“He thought it was too long, too sad, too depressing, and that nobody would ever play it,” recalled producer Billy Sherrill in Bob Allen’s 1994 book, George Jones: The Life and Times of a Honky Tonk Legend. “He hated the melody and wouldn’t learn it.” Sherrill also claims that Jones frustrated him by continually singing the song to the melody of the Kris Kristofferson hit “Help Me Make It Through the Night.”
In the 1989 documentary on Jones, Same Ole Me, Sherrill later added, “I said, ‘That’s not the melody,’ and he said, ‘Yeah, but it’s a better melody.’ I said, ‘It might be—Kristofferson would think so too, it’s his melody.’”
After recording the song, Sherrill reclaied Jones saying, “Nobody’ll buy that morbid son of a b—ch.”
Along with the single hitting No. 1, I Am What I Am was also a hit for Jones, peaking at No. 7, becoming his first Top 10 album in five years. In 2008, the song was also added to the National Recording Registry by the Library of Congress.
“George Jones is my favorite country singer in the world.” — Dolly Parton
Jones gained big fans of his comeback single, including Dolly Parton, who called “He Stopped Loving Her Today” one of her favorite country songs of all time.
“To me, that song is so well written, but it touches every cell in your body, in your heart,” said Parton of the Jones classic. “It’s just like he stopped loving her today; they hung that wreath upon the door. He was never going to stop loving her in his lifetime. He had to die.”
She continued, “It is so beautiful and, of course, George Jones is my favorite country singer in the world—always was, always will be. Nobody can tell that story like he did. So to me, that is the country classic of all time.”
Parton and Jones first collaborated on a recording of her song “Rockin’ Years,” which she first recorded as a duet with Ricky Van Shelton in 1991. An earlier version with Jones, recorded in 1988, remained unreleased until his 2008 album Burn Your Playhouse Down.
During the 70th anniversary of the Grand Ole Opry in 1996, the two also performed “You Gotta Be My Baby,” a childhood song of Parton’s and the song she sang at her own Opry debut in 1959, when she was introduced by Johnny Cash.
In 2005, Parton joined Jones for a cover of Hank Williams Jr.’s “The Bues Man,” released on his album Hits I Missed…And One I Didn’t and again on Burn Your Playhouse Down.
Photo: George Jones (Michael Ochs Archives/Getty Images)
Leave a Reply
Only members can comment. Become a member. Already a member? Log in.