Al Dexter

Al Dexter earned a spot in the popular music canon when he wrote "Pistol Packin' Mama" in 1942. Recorded by him a year later, the single sold three million copies -- not counting sheet music -- in less than two years and was ranked the third most popular song of the war years. Both Bing Crosby (with The Andrews Sisters) and Frank Sinatra recorded "Pistol Packin' Mama" for hits, and the song influenced country's pop-influenced Nashville sound of the '50s. It's difficult to believe, but Dexter also managed to influence the honky tonk style that later proved a vivid counterpoint to the Nashville sound. He owned a bar for a time during the '30s and popularized the term honky tonk -- slang for both rowdy bars and later the music that emerged from their jukeboxes -- on his 1937 recording "Honky Tonk Blues." However, the popular theory that Dexter actually coined the term can be blown full of holes; he had never heard of honky tonk before his songwriting partner James B. Paris suggested it as a title in 1936.

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