MIddle Age Crazy..the story behind the song

[jonny williams]

STORY BEHIND THE SONG (Doug Davis's Country newsletter)
Several hit songs have become hits on the way to the studio and according to Sonny Throckmorton, Jerry Lee Lewis ’ 1977 hit, “Middle Age Crazy” was one of those tunes!
Sonny commented,” A lot of my friends were showing the signs of middle age crazy. And at that timer there wasn’t a name for male menopause. We didn’t know what we were going thru and people weren’t talking about like they do now. There’s a lot of talk about it now but back then there just wasn’t that much said about it. In fact there wasn’t anything being said about it and I could see that different guys were getting’ to that age and then all of a sudden they would take up with some woman and bla..bla..bla. When I wrote the song, I wrote it “he’s a little bit crazy—tryin’ to prove he still can,” and I was going to the studio to record it and I had my mind in deep thought about what arrangement I was gonna do and while I was runnin’ the arrangement around in my heard on that one, I just accidentally sang “He’s middle age crazy.” And I thought “that’s it” so I changed it up on the way to the studio and it became “Middle Age Crazy.”
Jerry Lee’s Mercury Records single, “Middle Age Crazy” entered the country music charts October 29th, 1977 and peaked at # 4.

It was his 47th charted song and was on the charts for 18 weeks.

[martin bates]

thanks Jonny
& of course it was one of those unusual instances where the film of the same name was inspired by the song,starring Bruce Dern & Ann-Margret.
I thought at the time it showed what an impact the single must have had.

Martin.

[PianoLidAgain]

Jerry Kennedy on recording "Middle Age Crazy."
https://youtu.be/HiGcvJD6JTM?t=2053

Not an easy song to sing. Sonny Throckmorton's
version shows how Jerry might have first heard it.
https://youtu.be/GmezQ_P7bW0

[Ulli]

Wow, he also mentions that the recorded Chantilly Lace in an eight and a half minute version! Really would like to hear this!

[PeterC]

Jerry Kennedy on recording "Middle Age Crazy."
https://youtu.be/HiGcvJD6JTM?t=2053

Not an easy song to sing. Sonny Throckmorton's
version shows how Jerry might have first heard it.
https://youtu.be/GmezQ_P7bW0

Interesting! I've always thought that 'Middle Age Crazy' is one of the few JLL songs that sounded far better in the studio than live.