1. He was originally from Texas and apparently died in an auto accident in 1964;

2. He either wrote and/or recorded "I Gotta Get Drunk and I Shore Do Dread it" which I associate with Willie Nelson;

3. Liberty put out a posthumous album called "In Memoriam" which is one of my all time favorites; it includes "Helpless" which is one of the greatest tunes I've ever heard;

4. I also have a discography somewhere on my PC at home which lists a lot singles from the 50's, on Mercury and some other labels.

Everything that was said in the previous two posts was correct, and I'll add that Tommy Allsup was the producer of his great records on Liberty, and Billy Mize was the wonderful steel player on "Helpless" and the rest of the "In Memoriam" album. The album also has his great song "Double Life."

Joe played on the Big D Jamboree in Dallas and had Chuck Caldwell on steel, Jerry Case on guitar, and Johnny Case on piano.

Joe's son, Randy Carson, lives here in Austin and is one of my closest friends. He's a steel player, incidentally. Joe's widow Janice also lives in Austin and is still a very beautiful woman.

They don't make country singers like Little Joe Carson anymore, IMHO.

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Herb's Steel Guitar Homesite

[This message was edited by Herb Steiner on 08 June 2000 at 11:49 AM.]

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Have a good 'un! JH U-12

Thanks for posting all this good information!
On his WAMU-FM Saturday show, Eddie Stubbs just played "Who'll Buy My Memories," another Willie Nelson song that Joe Carson recorded, and mentioned that Carson got started at like the age of 12 or 13. It's neat to think that thee are enough recordings available where you could hear someone's sound grow and develop over a span of some 10 years, from, say, age 12 to 25. I don't know of another performer today where you can do that, at least not one who is still at it.