Mel Street
Mel Street | |
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![]() Street in 1975 | |
Background information | |
Birth name | King Malachi Street |
Born | Grundy, Virginia, United States | October 21, 1933
Died | October 21, 1978 Hendersonville, Tennessee, United States | (aged 45)
Genres | Country |
Occupation(s) | Singer-songwriter |
Instrument | Guitar |
Years active | 1972–1978 |
Labels | Metromedia, GRT, Polydor, Mercury |
King Malachi "Mel" Street (October 21, 1933 – October 21, 1978)[1] was an American country music singer who had 13 top-20 hits on the Billboard country charts.
Biography
[edit]Street was born near Grundy, Virginia, United States.[2][3] Publications cite his year of birth as 1933 and his family also maintains that he was born in 1933. However, his gravestone gives the year as 1936.[4][5] He began performing on western Virginia and West Virginia radio shows at the age of sixteen.[6] Street subsequently worked as a radio tower electrician in Ohio,[6] and as a nightclub performer in the Niagara Falls, New York area.[7] He moved back to West Virginia in 1963 to open an auto body shop.[8]
From 1968 to 1972, Street hosted a show on a Bluefield, West Virginia television station.[9] He recorded his first single, "Borrowed Angel" – which he also wrote – in 1969 for a small regional record label, Tandem Records.[6] A larger label, Royal American Records, picked it up in 1972 and it became a top-10 Billboard hit.[6] He recorded the biggest hit of his career, "Lovin' on Back Streets", in 1972.[6]
Street's last television appearance was in 1977, in which he performed his 1976 hit "I Met A Friend Of Yours Today" on That Good Ole Nashville Music.
Street recorded several hits in the mid-1970s, such as "You Make Me Feel More Like a Man," "Forbidden Angel," "I Met a Friend of Yours Today," "If I Had a Cheatin' Heart," and "Smokey Mountain Memories". He signed with Mercury Records in 1978, but suffering from clinical depression and alcoholism,[6] he killed himself by a self-inflicted gunshot on October 21, 1978, his 45th birthday.[3] He had a record debut on the country charts on October 21 as well, called "Just Hangin' On",[10] and later charted four posthumous songs. Street's idol, George Jones, sang "Amazing Grace" at his funeral.[6]
His posthumous album, Mel Street's Greatest Hits, was promoted via television advertisements in 1981, and sold 400,000 copies.[6]
Discography
[edit]Albums
[edit]Year | Album | US Country | Label |
---|---|---|---|
1972 | Borrowed Angel | 14 | Metromedia Country |
1973 | The Town Where You Live / Walk Softly On the Bridges |
37 | |
1974 | Two Way Street | 37 | GRT |
1975 | Smokey Mountain Memories | 16 | |
1976 | Mel Street's Greatest Hits | 26 | |
Country Colors | — | ||
1977 | Mel Street | 45 | Polydor |
1978 | Country Soul | 47 | |
Mel Street | — | Mercury | |
1980 | Many Moods of Mel | 61 | Sunbird |
Singles
[edit]Year | Single | Chart Positions | Album | |
---|---|---|---|---|
US Country | CAN Country | |||
1972 | "Borrowed Angel" | 7 | 9 | Borrowed Angel |
"Lovin' On Back Streets" | 5 | 8 | ||
1973 | "Walk Softly On the Bridges" | 11 | 6 | The Town Where You Live / Walk Softly On the Bridges |
"The Town Where You Live" | 38 | 58 | ||
"Lovin' On Borrowed Time" | 11 | 7 | Two Way Street | |
1974 | "You Make Me Feel More Like a Man" | 15 | — | |
"Forbidden Angel" | 16 | 47 | Smokey Mountain Memories | |
1975 | "Smokey Mountain Memories" | 13 | 43 | |
"Even If I Have to Steal" | 17 | 17 | ||
"(This Ain't Just Another) Lust Affair" | 23 | — | ||
1976 | "The Devil in Your Kisses (And the Angel in Your Eyes)" | 32 | — | Mel Street's Greatest Hits |
"I Met a Friend of Yours Today" | 10 | — | Country Colors | |
"Looking Out My Window Through the Pain" | 24 | — | ||
1977 | "Rodeo Bum" | 56 | — | |
"Barbara Don't Let Me Be the Last to Know" | 19 | — | Mel Street (1977) | |
"Close Enough for Lonesome" | 15 | — | ||
1978 | "If I Had a Cheating Heart" | 9 | — | Country Soul |
"Shady Rest" | 24 | — | ||
"Just Hangin' On" | 68 | — | Mel Street (1978) | |
1979 | "The One Thing My Lady Never Puts Into Words" | 17 | — | Many Moods of Mel |
1980 | "Tonight Let's Sleep On It Baby" | 30 | — | |
"Who'll Turn Out the Lights" | 36 | — | ||
1981 | "Slip Away" (w/ Sandy Powell) | 48 | — |
Footnotes
[edit]- ^ "October 21, 1978: Country Music Star Tragically Commits Suicide". November 8, 2021.
- ^ "October 21, 1933: Country Musician Mel Street Born in Virginia". West Virginia Public Broadcasting. October 21, 2019. Retrieved March 7, 2020.
- ^ a b Nelson, Dick (August 27, 2017). "Sunday Morning Country Classic Spotlight to Feature Mel Street". 98.1 Minnesota's New Country. Retrieved March 7, 2020.
- ^ Schuler and Delp 2002, p. 23.
- ^ "Mel Street – Grave of a Famous Person". Waymarking.com. The Social Security Death Index also shows 1936.
- ^ a b c d e f g h Colin Larkin, ed. (1993). The Guinness Who's Who of Country Music (First ed.). Guinness Publishing. p. 398. ISBN 0-85112-726-6.
- ^ "Mel Street | Biography & History". AllMusic. Retrieved August 10, 2021.
- ^ Schuler and Delp 2002, p. 46.
- ^ Schuler and Delp 2002, p. 51.
- ^ Schuler and Delp 2002, p. 243.
References
[edit]- Huey, Steve. (2003). Edited by Vladimir Bogdanov, Chris Woodstra, & Stephen Erlewine. "Mel Street (King Malachi Street)." All Music Guide to Country, 2nd ed. San Francisco: Backbeat Books, 2003. ISBN 0-87930-760-9
- Schuler, Dennis Sr. and Larry J. Delp. Mel Street – A Country Legend, Charleston, WV: Mountain State Press, 2002. ISBN 0-941092-47-X
External links
[edit]- 1933 births
- 1978 deaths
- 1978 suicides
- People from Grundy, Virginia
- American male singer-songwriters
- American country singer-songwriters
- Mercury Records artists
- Polydor Records artists
- 20th-century American singer-songwriters
- Singer-songwriters from Virginia
- 20th-century American male singers
- Suicides by firearm in Tennessee