Joe Ely

Joe Ely launched his career as a defiant figure in the Texas music landscape and has since earned recognition as one of the state’s most revered veteran artists, all while maintaining a remarkably consistent artistic vision. His recordings encompass intimate acoustic narratives alongside vigorous blues, rockabilly, and honky-tonk swing, yet every performance is anchored by his talent for crafting believable, emotionally resonant character portraits. A longtime participant in the Texas singer-songwriter circle, Ely belonged, alongside Jimmie Dale Gilmore and Butch Hancock, to the Flatlanders, a group that helped shape that scene during its formative years. Within a discography stretching across more than six decades, 1978’s Honky Tonk Masquerade stands out as one of his most varied and compelling early country efforts; 1980’s Live Shots, captured during his tours supporting the Clash, represents his most forceful rock statement; 1995’s Letter to Laredo offers a quietly powerful acoustic portrait; and 2024’s Driven to Drive delivers an unadorned, wide-ranging tribute to the nomadic life.

Singer, songwriter, and guitarist Joe Ely entered the world as Earle R. Ely on February 9, 1947, in Amarillo, Texas. His relatives had been employed by the Rock Island Line railroad since the early 1900s. At age twelve the family relocated to Lubbock, where his father opened a secondhand clothing shop. After witnessing a childhood performance by Jerry Lee Lewis, Ely decided to pursue music and briefly studied violin and steel guitar before concentrating on the six-string. When he turned fourteen his father passed away, and his mother spent a year in an institution recovering from the loss, leaving him and his brother in the care of relatives living elsewhere. Once the household reunited in Lubbock, he took a dishwashing job to help support them.

He soon left school and began performing in local clubs, assembling the Twilights, a band that grew popular enough for him to abandon restaurant work. Restlessness quickly returned, however, prompting travels that first took him to other Texas towns, then California and New York, and eventually Europe, where he worked with a theater troupe. That itinerant stretch lasted from 1963 through 1970. Back in Lubbock during the summer of 1971, he joined forces with fellow singer-songwriters Butch Hancock and Jimmie Dale Gilmore, along with additional musicians, to form the Flatlanders, a country-folk ensemble. Plantation Records, a small Nashville label, expressed interest, and in March 1972 the group traveled to Tennessee to record an album that the company issued only in limited form, crediting it to Jimmie Dale & the Flatlanders; the project reportedly appeared solely on eight-track tape.

Ely resumed his travels across the country yet returned to Lubbock by 1974, when he assembled a standing backup group for local and regional gigs. The Joe Ely Band included Ely on acoustic guitar and vocals, Jesse Taylor on electric guitar, Lloyd Maines on steel guitar, Gregg Wright on bass, and Steve Keeton on drums. A demo tape reached members of Jerry Jeff Walker’s band, who passed it to Walker, who in turn gave it to an MCA Records A&R executive; Ely signed with the label in fall 1975. He recorded his debut album, Joe Ely, during 1976, and it appeared on January 10, 1977, accompanied by the single “All My Love,” which entered the Billboard country chart. Five of the album’s tracks were original Ely compositions; the remaining five came from Hancock or Gilmore.

More than a year later, on February 13, 1978, he released his second album, Honky Tonk Masquerade, by which time accordionist Ponty Bone had joined the ensemble. The set again blended Ely originals—among them the title track, the Jerry Lee Lewis–styled “Fingernails” featuring Shane Keister on piano, and “Cornbread Moon,” all issued as singles—with songs by Hancock and Gilmore, including the latter’s “Tonight I Think I’m Gonna Go Downtown,” co-written with John X. Reed and previously heard on the Flatlanders’ recording. A cover of Hank Williams’ “Honky Tonkin’” rounded out the collection. Although critics praised Honky Tonk Masquerade and a 1990 Rolling Stone retrospective listed it among the essential albums of the 1970s, commercial sales remained modest. Ely returned the following year with Down on the Drag, issued in February 1979; it featured four Hancock compositions and five new Ely songs and reached the Cash Box country chart.

Throughout the late 1970s Ely and his band toured steadily, headlining smaller venues and supporting major acts. One unexpected pairing came with the British punk band the Clash, who befriended him and invited him to open dates in the United Kingdom. The exposure broadened his overseas audience and introduced him to rock listeners. MCA’s British division recorded a live album during the tour, releasing Live Shots, credited to the Joe Ely Band, exclusively in the U.K. in spring 1980; by then Robert Marquam had replaced Steve Keeton on drums. Around the same time, the British reissue label Charly Records licensed the Flatlanders’ material and issued it more widely on the compilation One Road More.

Back home, MCA’s American branch initially chose not to release Live Shots domestically, preferring to await Ely’s next studio effort while continuing to market him as a country artist. That project, Musta Notta Gotta Lotta, emerged in March 1981 on SouthCoast Records, an imprint created by Ely’s manager and still handled by MCA. Personnel changes included Michael Robberson replacing Gregg Wright on bass, while Smokey Joe Miller on saxophone and Reese Wynans on keyboards joined the lineup; Lloyd Maines had stepped away from touring but continued contributing to studio sessions. The album mixed Ely originals, including the title track, with Hancock and Gilmore songs, among them Gilmore’s “Dallas,” another holdover from the Flatlanders’ album. Musta Notta Gotta Lotta registered Ely’s growing presence in both country and rock markets, appearing on the Cash Box country chart as well as the Billboard and Cash Box pop listings, with the title song also reaching Billboard’s mainstream rock chart. In October 1981 SouthCoast/MCA finally issued Live Shots in the United States, adding a bonus four-song EP titled Texas Special; the package entered the Billboard pop chart.

By the close of 1982 Ely appeared poised for a country-rock crossover breakthrough, having opened for Linda Ronstadt, Tom Petty & the Heartbreakers, and the Rolling Stones. Years of nonstop touring eventually took a toll, however; guitarist Jesse Taylor departed, drummer Robert Marquam passed away, and Ely disbanded the remaining lineup. He withdrew to his Austin home with his wife, Sharon Glaudt, and their infant daughter, Marie Elena, where he began writing material for a film project while experimenting with computers and synthesizers. When financing for the movie collapsed, he took the accumulated songs to Los Angeles and recorded them in synth-rock arrangements, resulting in Hi-Res. Released in May 1984 after more than three years without new music, the album drew mixed reviews and modest sales.

Ely submitted another album to MCA, which declined to issue it, thereby ending the contract. He regrouped with a fresh band featuring lead guitarist David Grissom, bassist Jimmy Pettit, drummer Davis McLarty, and keyboardist Mitch Watkins, who had played on Hi-Res. Signing with the independent HighTone Records, he released his sixth studio album, Lord of the Highway, in July 1987. The record earned positive notices and included a pair of Butch Hancock songs, yet Ely’s own “Me and Billy the Kid” attracted the most outside attention, later covered by Ramblin’ Jack Elliott and Marty Stuart. Dig All Night followed in October 1988, consisting entirely of Ely compositions, one of them the title track co-written with Watkins, who did not appear on the sessions. Several tracks dated from the unreleased MCA project. “Settle for Love” was later recorded by Kelly Willis, while “For Your Love” became a country-chart single for Chris LeDoux in 1993.

By the late 1980s Ely’s sound, having shed most of its overt country trappings, aligned more closely with the mainstream rock approach of John Mellencamp and Tom Petty. Simultaneously, a harder-edged style had gained acceptance in Nashville, where Dwight Yoakam, Hank Williams, Jr., and Steve Earle had recently topped the country album chart. In that climate MCA renewed interest, re-signing Ely and issuing his second live album, Live at Liberty Lunch, in November 1990. His first concert recording in a decade, it surveyed material from the period since Live Shots and spent five weeks on the Billboard country chart. Also in 1990, Rounder Records released More a Legend Than a Band, a revised edition of the Flatlanders’ long-unavailable 1972 album.

In early 1992 Ely joined John Mellencamp, Dwight Yoakam, John Prine, and James McMurtry in the impromptu country-rock collective Buzzin’ Cousins to record Mellencamp’s “Sweet Suzanne” for the soundtrack of the film Falling from Grace, in which Mellencamp starred; the track reached the country singles chart. MCA released Ely’s eighth studio album, Love and Danger, in September 1992. He made his acting debut in July 1994 in the musical Chippy: Diaries of a West Texas Hooker at Lincoln Center in New York City, contributing songs to the score and appearing on the cast album issued by Hollywood Records. MCA followed with his ninth studio album, Letter to Laredo, in August 1995, by which point Glenn Fukunaga had become his bassist. Though not strictly unplugged, the record emphasized acoustic textures more than earlier releases and spotlighted flamenco guitarist Teye, with occasional harmony vocals from Jimmie Dale Gilmore, Raul Malo of the Mavericks, and Bruce Springsteen; it entered the Billboard country chart.

Although Ely had produced albums for both Gilmore and Hancock, the three declined repeated suggestions to revive the Flatlanders until 1998, when they reformed under the old name to record “South Wind of Summer” for the soundtrack of the film The Horse Whisperer, released in April. Ely issued his tenth studio album, Twistin’ in the Wind, the following month; it spent four weeks on the Billboard country chart, yet after four releases without a major hit, MCA dropped him once more. In September he took part in the self-titled debut album by the Tex-Mex supergroup Los Super Seven, alongside Freddy Fender, Joel Jose Guzman, Flaco Jiménez, Rubén Ramos, Doug Sahm, Rick Trevino, and David Hidalgo and Cesar Rosas of Los Lobos; the project shared a Grammy Award for Best Mexican-American/Tejano Music Performance.

In 2000 Ely placed two live recordings on the market. His 1990 solo acoustic set at the Cambridge Folk Festival yielded the six-song EP Live at the Cambridge Folk Festival on BBC/Strange Fruit Records in the U.K. He also signed with Rounder, which issued his third full-length concert album, Live @ Antone’s, in June; the January 1999 performances featured returning members Jesse Taylor and Lloyd Maines, along with Teye, bassist Gary Herman, drummer Rafael O’Malley Gayol, and accordionist Joel Guzman, and the album reached the Billboard country chart. The Flatlanders further advanced their reunion with a national tour in late winter 2000. In May 2002 Ely, Gilmore, and Hancock completed the reformation with a new studio album, Now Again, released by New West Records; Ely co-wrote twelve of the fourteen songs and produced the set, which climbed into the Top 20 of the Billboard country chart. His eleventh studio album, Streets of Sin, appeared in July 2003 and also charted on Billboard’s country list. Having waited thirty years between their first and second albums, the Flatlanders delivered their third, Wheels of Fortune, just two years later; again produced by Ely, it surfaced in January 2004 and remained on the Billboard country chart for eleven weeks. Among the four Ely compositions was “Indian Cowboy,” a song he had never previously recorded but which Guy Clark, Tom Russell, Townes Van Zandt, and Katy Moffatt had each cut over the years. Six months afterward came another Flatlanders release, the archival Live ’72.

Ely had skipped the second Los Super Seven album, Canto, in 2001, but rejoined the collective for 2005’s Heard It on the X. Departing Rounder, he launched his own imprint, Rack ’Em Records, and in February 2007 issued his twelfth studio album, Happy Songs from Rattlesnake Gulch. That same month the University of Texas Press published his memoir of life on the road, Bonfire of Roadmaps. That spring he toured with Lyle Lovett, John Hiatt, and Guy Clark. In April Rack ’Em followed with Silver City, an acoustic collection of early Ely material newly recorded with only Ely and accordionist Joel Guzman. The two were jointly credited on the label’s next release, Live Cactus!, which appeared in March 2008. Ely returned to the studio in 2010, and the sessions produced Satisfied at Last, his first collection of new songs in four years, issued by Rack ’Em in 2011. The introspective Panhandle Rambler arrived in 2015, accompanied by the announcement that Ely would serve as Texas State Musician for 2016. Live performances occupied much of the ensuing period, including Flatlanders tours and co-headlining dates with Alejandro Escovedo; Escovedo included a version of Ely’s “Silver City” on his 2018 album The Crossing, featuring Ely’s harmony vocals, and Ely also contributed to the 2021 Spanish-language counterpart, La Cruzada. In 2020, as the COVID-19 pandemic halted touring and quieted the Texas music scene, Ely assembled Love in the Midst of Mayhem from previously unfinished songs stored in his archives.

Another archival project surfaced in 2022. Flatland Lullaby collected understated, heartfelt recordings Ely made in the mid-1980s at his home studio with a small circle of friends that included Butch Hancock, Jimmie Dale Gilmore, Lloyd Maines, David Grissom, and Roscoe Beck. Originally created as a Christmas gift for his then-three-year-old daughter, the album circulated informally among family and friends over the years. Maria Elena Ely, now in her forties and an established photographer, encouraged her father to release it publicly, and Rack ’Em issued Flatland Lullaby in October 2022. 2024’s Driven to Drive drew from the same home-recording archives, presenting twelve songs centered on life on the road and saluting various vehicles, from eighteen-wheel semis to customized motorcycles. Most tracks were captured with minimal accompaniment, though a few overdubs were added at a professional studio in Dripping Springs, Texas; one such addition featured Bruce Springsteen guesting on “Odds of the Blues.” Also in 2024 came Fighting the Rain, a live album recorded in Italy during a 1993 European tour.