john d. loudermilk
oak ridge boys
Loudermilk
Break My Mind has been recorded by The Box Tops, Glen Campbell,
Jerry Lee Lewis, Lee Hazlewood, Linda Ronstadt, Roy Orbison,
Anne Murray, The Flying Burrito Brothers, Wreckless Eric, and many many more...
never composer John D Loudermilk himself ...
live version of John D. - 2007
Poets and Prophets
Country Music Hall Of Fame And Museum,
Ford Theater, Nashville TN.
Break My Mind | Lyrics: Baby, oh, baby Tell the man at the ticket stand That you've changed your mind Let me run on out and tell the cab To keep his meter flying 'Cause if you say goodbye to me, babe You're gonna break my mind Break my mind, break my mind No, I just can't stand to hear them big jet engines whine Break my mind, break my mind If you leave you're gonna leave a babalin' fool behind Baby, oh, baby Let me take your suitcase Off the scales in time Tell the man that you've suddenly developed A thing about flyin' 'Cause if you say goodbye to me, babe You know you're gonna break my mind (c) 1966 and 1967, Acuff-Rose Publ. Inc. (source: Standard Songs Pop/ Country/ Blues/ Folk/ Instumentals/ Novelty, Acuff-Rose Publications Inc. 1956-1973) Roy Orbison picture sleeve Dutch release |
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A LITTLE BIO
As published by JDL, telling about the start of his career, source the Acuff Rose Song Folio Book, publ. ca. 1964Back in 1934 on the last day of March... I was born.
It all happened in Durham - a small half university, half industrial town in central North Carolina. I grew up around cigarette factories and hosiery mills and played roller-bat in the street like everyone else. Dad was 50 and mother was 40 when I was born so my two sisters were already grown and away from home by the time I came along.
Dad could neither read nor write so I used to go with him to the grocery store on Saturday afternoon and sign his pay check for him... (I always did believe that's why he gave me the same name as his). He was a carpenter all his life and never changed occupations. Mother was a housewife and a sweet and wonderful mother but, bless her heart, she liked to move a lot. She seemed happiest when the big moving van was backing up to the porch and the pasteboard boxes started to move. From the time I can first remember to the time I left home we had moved 19 times and never got out of the same school district.
Sending off for a Lone Ranger Mask, a scooter made out of an old rusty roller skate, Batman comic books, Mother teaching me to play her old guitar, and my own private tree house are all fond memories of my childhood.My early religious influences were mostly along the gospel or holiness line. Singing to the accompaniment of "Stringed Instruments", Horns, Tamborines, Hand Clapping and the Big Bass Drum was my first conception of music... and a lasting one. Shouting at prayer meetings and giving one's own personal testimony was The Rule Of The Day.
Aside from the religious music, I also liked folk music (back then they called it "Hillbilly Music"). Sunday school came awfully early after staying up all night listening to The Grand Ole Opry on the radio.My folks had always wanted me to become a preacher, but when I became a teenager instead, they became aware that I had become aware of a certain thing called social pressure. So I turned in my Christmas bell and uniform and started singing and playing more "Pop" type stuff on the guitar... the guitar that mother and the Salvation Army had taught me how to play.
Yea, Ivory Joe Hunter, Fats Domino and Lloyd Price were what was happening.
I later got hung up on concert guitar and all through high school I was playing and singing a combination of Jimmy Reed, Eddy Arnold and Andres Segovia.
On graduation from high school I went to work at my hometown television station painting sets and doing commercial art work. I was also on the air an hour a day playing bass fiddle in the Studio Combo and doing an occasional tune with my guitar on camera. It was during this time that I discovered the works of Kahlil Gibran, the Far Eastern poet and philosopher, who inspired me to try my hand at writing.
One night after work I wrote a poem about A Rose And A Baby Ruth candy bar. It sounded pretty good, so I put a tune to it with my guitar. I sang it on the show the next day and the phones started ringing... people wanting to hear it again.
George Hamilton IV (who was a student close by at UNC) was one of the ones who called. Before I knew it, he had recorded the thing and bam!... overnight the record was a hit.
George was a star and I was a songwriter!!I had always wanted to go to college so off I went -down to a little junior college in the eastern part of the state. It was here that I wrote "Sittin' In The Balcony" (which was later to become Eddie Cochrans first hit record.)
I began to get offers from publishers in New York and Nashville, so before long I went home to pack. I had a whole bunch of songs by then and a little bit of royalties left so I headed on out to NashviIle, Tennessee.
John's saturday night's band in the early 1950s: the Carolina Pinetoppers. Young John D in the center with fiddle.
"The popular orchestra is shown here during a rendition of one of their tricky hillbilly numbers". Other group members Burton Spicer, Eddie Hill, Donald Boswell and Philip Forest.
Picture from a local NC newspaper (picture courtesy Mike Spicer).