Country rebel David Allan Coe passed away Wednesday at the age of 86, his booking agent David Wade confirmed to ABC Audio.
“One of the best singers, songwriters, and performers of our time [and] never to be forgotten,” his wife, Kimberly Hastings Coe, told Rolling Stone. “My husband, my friend, my confidant and my life for many years. I’ll never forget him and I don’t want anyone else to ever forget him either.”
He’s perhaps best known for the perennial bar sing-along “You Never Even Called Me by My Name,” with its spoken word section that Ella Langley pointed to as one of the inspirations for her non-traditional smash “you look like you love me.”
Born in Akron, Ohio, in 1939, Coe did early stints in the penal system for a variety of charges, grand theft auto among them.
By 1967 he’d moved to Nashville, where he was discovered by producer Shelby Singleton. By 1973, he’d written Tanya Tucker’s #1 “Would You Lay With Me (in a Field of Stone).”
The top-10 success of his own “You Never Even Called Me by My Name” came in 1975, followed by another one of his major triumphs in 1977: Johnny Paycheck took Coe’s “Take This Job and Shove It” to #1, as well.
Though he continued making albums until 2006, collaborating with members of the rock band Pantera on the Rebel Meets Rebel project, his last major musical success was 1983’s top-five hit “The Ride,” an ode to Hank Williams.
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