Top Ten Ruby Songs: Rock ‘n’ Roll Ruby (#7)

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A new week dawns, and it promises to be a cold on here in the land of the horse race. Poor @LouAvul has been cruising in lovely weather and comes home to this. Sorry. I hope a little rockabilly can warm you up today as I continue the look at songs with “Ruby” in the title. #7: Rock ‘n’ Roll Ruby - Warren Smith Oh, what could have been. You’ve most likely never heard of Warren Smith unless you’re a die-hard rockabilly fan. That’s probably his fault. You see, he was offered to be part of Johnny Cash’s touring show, but Smith turned him down. It seems Smith thought he was a much bigger star than he actually was. His life took a downward spiral, and he did time for armed robbery. I guess he learned his lesson, because he became a support act on one of those “rock and roll revival” shows…and he found that people in England hadn’t forgotten him at all. He died of a heart attack at the age of 47, enjoying more success as a “nostalgia” tour artist than he ever got in his heyday. While he had some country music success (most notably, the great song “Odds and Ends, Bits and Pieces”), his legacy is rockabilly. He’s enshrined in the Rockabilly Hall of Fame. This was his first single. It’s credited to Cash as a songwriter, although Smith later said that George Jones wrote it and sold it to Cash (for cash, $40 ). That’s possible, because Jones had a short and unsuccessful attempt at rockabilly as “Thumper Jones.” Regardless, it’s a forgotten part of the 50s, when the lines between country and rock were very blurred. Rock ‘n’ Roll Ruby Written by Johnny Cash Recorded by Warren Smith Released as a single, 1956 She put a quarter in the jukebox: