Donald Eugene Lytle, better known by his stage name Johnny Paycheck, was born on this date in born Greenfield, Ohio in 1938.
Multi-instrumentalist and Grand Ole Opry member most famous for recording the David Allan Coe song “Take This Job and Shove It”, Johnny Paycheck achieved his greatest success in the 1970s as a major force in country music’s “Outlaw Movement” popularized by artists such as Waylon Jennings, Willie Nelson, Billy Joe Shaver, and Merle Haggard. In the 1980s, his music career slowed due to drug, alcohol and legal problems. He served a prison sentence in the early 1990s and his declining health effectively ended his career in early 2000.
“I’m a man who believes that right is right and wrong is wrong. Treat me right, and I will give you my all. Treat me wrong, and I will give you nothing. They don’t like me for that, but that’s the way I am”…. Johnny Paycheck