Died On This Date (September 6, 1984) Ernest Tubb / Country Music Pioneer
themusicsover Ernest Tubb
February 9, 1914 – September 6, 1984
Ernest Tubb was one of country music’s greatest pioneers. With a career that spanned almost 50 years, Tubb ushered in what would be called “honky tonk” with his 1941 hit, “Walking The Floor Over You.” The son of a sharecropper, Tubb spent much of his youth working the fields of Texas, learning to sing and play the guitar during his off hours. His early music jobs consisted of singing at radio stations in San Antonio and San Angelo, Texas. In the mid ’30s, he struck up a friendship with the widow of Jimmie Rodgers, one of his all-time idols. It was she that helped him get his first deal with RCA Records. Tubb was never accused of having the best singing voice, but he certainly put together some of the greatest bands country music has ever known. 1n 1947, Tubb opened Ernest Tubb Record Shop in downtown Nashville. That store, along with locations in Pigeon Forge, Tennessee and Fort Worth, Texas are still thriving businesses, catering mostly to the classic country fan. Ernest Tubb died of empysema at the age of 70.
What You Should Own
Mickie Jones was the co-founder of and bassist for pioneering ’70s glam metal band, Angel. Formed with guitarist, Punky Meadows in in 1975, Angel would be the link between Bowie and heavy metal. It was Gene Simmons of Kiss who helped the band get signed to Casablanca Records, and in an ironic twist, the members of Angel chose to market themselves dressed in all white as sort of the “anti-Kiss.” The band’s slick pop metal and androgynous image helped pave the way for such ’80s hair bands as Poison, Warrant and Motley Crue. Even the band’s own keyboardist, Gregg Guiffria would go on to have ’80s metal hits of his own. Even though Angel released some of the most memorable hard rock albums of the ’70s, (IE: Helluva Band and On Earth As It Is In Heaven), they never reached much beyond a cult status. Outside of Angel, Jones played in BUX with Meadows and Joe Perry Project singer, Ralph Morman, and Empire with LA Guns drummer, Steve Riley. It has also been reported that Jones was once asked to join the New York Dolls. In recent years, he was working in the film industry. Mickie Jones died of liver cancer on September 5, 2009.
Skip Miller was a respected music industry executive whose career spanned almost 40 years. Miller started his career at in the promotion department of Motown Records, where he eventually became President. After the company was sold in 1988, Miller moved over to RCA Records as Sr. Vice President. In recent years, Miller ran his own management company, Panda Entertainment Group. Skip Miller died of a heart attack at a Los Angeles hospital.
As one of contemporary country music’s first leading ladies, Dottie West opened the door for such female superstars as Dolly Parton, Barbara Mandrell, 
Rich Cunningham was a respected union organizer and one-time head of his own label, Happy Days Records, which he founded in 1995 while still in college. The punk label, named after the popular ’70s television program whose lead character shared the same name as Cunningham, was the one-time home to such acts as Ink & Dagger and Hot Water Music. In later years, Cunningham formed New Labor, an organization that helped low-income and immigrant workers. He had suffered from colon cancer since 2005, but cause of death was not immediately released. He was 32.