| "Me and Bobby McGee" | ||||
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Single by Roger Miller | ||||
| from the album Roger Miller 1970 | ||||
| Released | July 1969 | |||
| Format | 7" | |||
| Recorded | May 16, 1969 | |||
| Genre | Country | |||
| Length | 4:02 | |||
| Label | BNA 69035 | |||
| Writer(s) | Kris Kristofferson Fred Foster |
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| Producer | Jerry Kennedy | |||
| Roger Miller singles chronology | ||||
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"Me and Bobby McGee" is a song written by Kris Kristofferson and Fred Foster, originally performed by Roger Miller. Others performed the song later, including Kristofferson himself[1], and Janis Joplin who topped the U.S. singles chart with the song in 1971 after her death, making the song the second posthumous number-one single in U.S. chart history after "(Sittin' On) The Dock of the Bay" by Otis Redding.
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Roger Miller was the first artist to have a hit with the song, peaking with it at No. 12 on the US country chart in 1969. Gordon Lightfoot's version hit No. 13 on the pop chart and No. 1 country in his native Canada in 1970. Lightfoot sang the song after a detailed tribute to Kris Kristofferson in a CBC broadcast from the summer 1969 Charlottetown Festival. In his introduction, Lightfoot referred to the Miller version and said he intended to record it himself "the way it should be done." In a 2008 autobiography, Don Reid and Harold Reid of the Statler Brothers say Kristofferson promised it to them, but when they later inquired about recording it, they learned Miller had already cut the song. The Reids say there were no hard feelings, and were happy about Miller's success with the song. The song was later included on a Statler Brothers album, and was not released as a single.
Janis Joplin also covered the song for inclusion on her Pearl album only a few days before her death in October 1970. Kristofferson had sung the song for Joplin, and singer Bob Neuwirth taught it to her. Kristofferson, however, did not know she had covered it until after her death (the first time he heard it was the day after she died).[2] Joplin's version topped the charts to become her only number one single and only the second posthumous number one single in rock & roll history (the first was "(Sittin' on) the Dock of the Bay" by Otis Redding). In 2004, the Janis Joplin version of this song was ranked No. 148 on Rolling Stone's list of the 500 Greatest Songs of All Time.
Kristofferson performed the song live at the Isle of Wight Festival 1970 and a CD and DVD of the event were issued 30 years later as Message to Love: The Isle of Wight Festival 1970.
The Janis Joplin version was used prominently in the epilogue of Rainer Werner Fassbinder's epic film of Berlin Alexanderplatz.
The Grateful Dead regularly covered the song between 1970 and 1974 and a few more times in 1981. Bob Weir's cover seems to be a combination of Kristofferson's and Joplin's versions.
In the original version of the song, Bobby is a woman; Janis Joplin, who was a lover and a friend of Kristofferson's from the beginning of her career to her death, changed the sex and a few of the lyrics in her cover. Kristofferson states he did not write this song for her, but the song is associated with her. Especially, he has said, in the line, "Somewhere near Salinas, Lord, I let her slip away." In a conversation with director Monte Hellman called "Somewhere Near Salinas", available in the supplements to the Two-Lane Blacktop Criterion Collection DVD release (a film in which Kristofferson's version is used on the soundtrack), Kristofferson states that the film La Strada was an inspiration for the song and remarks on the irony of how a song inspired by a classic "road movie" should come to be used in another.
| Chart (1969) | Peak position |
|---|---|
| U.S. Billboard Hot Country Singles | 12 |
| U.S. Billboard Bubbling Under Hot 100 | 22 |
| Canadian RPM Country Tracks | 3 |
Other artists
| Preceded by "Everything a Man Could Ever Need" by Glen Campbell |
RPM Country Tracks number one single (Gordon Lightfoot version) September 19, 1970 |
Succeeded by "Countryfied" by Dick Damron |
| Preceded by "One Bad Apple" by The Osmonds |
Billboard Hot 100 number one single (Janis Joplin version) March 20–27, 1971 |
Succeeded by "Just My Imagination (Running Away with Me)" by The Temptations |
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