George Jones

Fabled musician traveling again after accident

George Jones lays out the 'Cold Hard Truth'

May 18, 2000
Web posted at: 5:12 p.m. EST (2112 GMT)

(CNN) -- In country music's new world of designer clothing and tattoos, there's the man with helmet hair, pastel pants and a voice honed by hard whiskey and harder living.

George Jones is on the road again.

A little more than a year after a car crash left him hospitalized in critical condition, the man dubbed the king of country music is packing a full tour schedule.

Jones has nearly 50 years' experience playing hundreds of honky-tonks and concert halls. Still, he admits getting anxious before taking the stage.

"I still get a little nervous," he said, "shaky legs, and like I want to go to the bathroom after I've already just went."

What do you expect? He's only human -- perhaps too human.

Drinking, drugs, and canceled shows had earned him the nickname "No-Show Jones," along with a slew of legendary stories. "If there's been a tale told, it's been told about George Jones," he said in a recent interview.

Things got worse after his divorce from Tammy Wynette in 1975.

	"COLD HARD TRUTH"
"Choices" [230k MPEG-3] or [315k WAV] "Cold Hard Truth" [190k MPEG-3] or [260k WAV] "Sinners and Saints" [170k MPEG-3] or [235k WAV] (Courtesy WEA/Elektra Records)

"I didn't think there was any way whatsoever to get back to any level," he said. "I had completely given up."

That's until he met his fourth wife, Nancy, whom he credits with getting his life back together. He even reunited with Wynette in 1995 to make the album "One." She died three years later.

"I just felt so much better about knowing that when she did pass away, that ... we had got back together, and we were friends," Jones said.

Last year he released "Cold Hard Truth" and "Live with the Possum," after a near-fatal car accident in March. He suffered a collapsed lung and a lacerated liver when his sport-utility vehicle hit a bridge abutment near his home in Franklin, a Nashville suburb.

It took two hours for rescuers to free him from the vehicle and he was then airlifted to the hospital, where he was placed on life support.

The 68-year-old singer admitted he had been drinking.

"Well, I had done a lot of praying before that accident for the good Lord to open my eyes some way," he said, "(even) if he had to hit me with a sledgehammer."

Jones pleaded guilty to drunken driving and entered a rehab program.

"The good Lord has been good to me to always give me another chance," he said. "I got a feeling at my age he might have gave me my last one, so I better take advantage of this one."

Heart trouble puts George Jones back in hospital
April 7, 1999
George Jones develops pneumonia, placed back on ventilator
March 12, 1999
Country singer George Jones condition upgraded
March 8, 1999
George Jones remains critical after car crash
March 7, 1999
George Jones critical after Tennessee crash
March 6, 1999

Elektra/Asylum

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