Flashback: Dude Mowrey, Dude Mowrey

Other than his own daughter Pam, I am not sure how many artists came from the Mel Tillis mentoring tree.

Maybe Dude Mowrey was the one.

Tillis apparently helped develop Mowrey, a Floridian from Fort Lauderdale, as a teen. He secured him a record deal with Capitol Records. Mowrey released his Jimmy Bowen-produced debut album Honky Tonk Song in 1991. I admittedly never heard anything from this collection. His cover of the Tillis-penned title track didn’t even chart. Webb Pierce famously had a massive hit with it back in 1957. The second single, “Cowboys Don’t Cry” – later recorded by Daron Norwood in 1994 – peaked unnoticed at #65 on the Billboard country charts. What Mowrey did do was record the first version of Shawn Camp’s “Fallin’ Never Felt So Good.” Camp would later record the song, as would Mark Chesnutt.

Mowrey resurfaced two years later on Arista Records. Mike Clute of Diamond Rio-fame produced Mowrey’s sophomore set, along with label head Tim Dubois. The eponymous second album was released in 1993. Three singles were released from the record, none of them climbing higher than #57 on the country charts.

I remember watching the video for the second single on CMT. “Hold on Elroy” was written by Dennis Linde and featured his Arista label-mate Lee Roy Parnell on slide guitar. That association netted Mowrey’s second single an even lower position on the singles chart, stalling at #69. Nonetheless, I liked his sound and energy enough to purchase the cassette. As I have mentioned before, I was under the assumption and expectation that any one of these young stars could be the next big thing.

I really know nothing about Mowrey beyond what anyone could learn on Wikipedia. The collection’s greatest sin might be how rock steady and consistently enjoyable it is. Mowrey has a resonant and rich baritone with a warm twang. In terms of flavorless marketing, Mowrey’s head-shot rivals Steve Holy’s Blue Moon seven years down the line. It looks like a high school senior photo.

Much like Holy, Mowrey deserved better. I guess it is a testament to the spirit of Nashville in the early nineties that so many solid and worthy artists were signed to major deals, but is just as much an indictment of how ruthless the competition was that artists like Stacy Dean Campbell, Shawn Camp, and Dude Mowrey couldn’t get any traction at radio. They almost seemed to be dead-on-arrival with their record deal unless they broke in spectacular fashion. Thus has it always been. Just ask McBride and the Ride.

Mowrey had his chance. He is given a better than average collection of material to work with. The production is crisp and clean, but admittedly sanitary and safe. There is, however, plenty of dobro, fiddle, and steel guitar to sparkle enough to keep the whole affair decidedly country; as bright as it sounds, this is no cross-over album. As a vocalist, Mowrey shines on the Kevin Welch/Gary Nicholson song “Happy Ever After (Comes One Day at a Time).” “Dr. Wurlitzer” swings and is wonderfully predictable in the best of ways.

“Walk Away” is a lovely showcase for Mowrey’s emotive voice. It sounds like a lost Billy Dean performance. Mowrey might be at his best on “What Kind of Memories Remain,” a wise song extolling good memories as the measure of a life well lived . He handles the Allen Shamblin/Jon Vezner song “Somewhere In Between” with an unexpected level of maturity and wisdom for a twenty one year-old.

“View From the Bottom” is Mowrey’s one co-write with Ralph Murphy. It is a solid by-the-numbers version of life lessons being delivered from a fallen star with the great line “Chase the women, drink the whiskey, smoke ’em if you got em/Here’s a post card from hell, it’s a view from the bottom.”

The ten song collection is strong enough to have warranted another go with radio, but Mowrey’s career took a turn for the worse and he was never heard from again.