In 2000 Pam Tillis became a Grand Ole Opry member in the same institution where she had first appeared beside her father at eight years old, but this time the famous name on that stage was fully her own.
Mel had built his catalog and Pam had built her own.
Pam Tillis grew up surrounded by country music. Her father Mel Tillis was already building a major Nashville career and Pam was only eight when she joined him onstage at the Ryman Auditorium and sang “Tom Dooley” during her first Grand Ole Opry appearance.
But the famous last name created its own problem. Pam wanted to know what she sounded like without simply becoming Mel Tillis’ daughter who sang country.
Running Away To Find Her Own Sound
She experimented with other styles, moved to California, worked in jazz rock and eventually returned to Nashville as a songwriter. Her own recording career struggled.
An early Elektra single and the pop oriented Warner Bros. album Above and Beyond the Doll of Cutey in 1983 failed to establish her. Several later singles also missed the country Top 50.
But while Nashville was not buying Pam Tillis as a star, it was buying her songs. Her material was recorded by artists including Chaka Khan, Gloria Gaynor, Conway Twitty, Juice Newton and Highway 101, whose version of “Someone Else’s Trouble Now” reached the country Top 10.
Testing Songs And Holding On To Memphis
Meanwhile Tillis kept performing and testing material at places such as Nashville’s Bluebird Cafe. One song she carried with her was “Maybe It Was Memphis” and she had already recorded an earlier version during her Warner years, but it remained unreleased.
Then Tim DuBois entered the picture. While building Arista Nashville, DuBois signed Tillis in 1989. After years of false starts she made a simple decision that this time she would make an honest country record.
This time she would make an honest country record.
The Breakthrough She Had Waited Years To Earn
The result was Put Yourself in My Place. “Don’t Tell Me What to Do” reached No. 5 in early 1991, finally giving Tillis the breakthrough her earlier experiments had not. “One of Those Things” followed into the Top 10.
Then she returned to “Maybe It Was Memphis” and Arista released the new version in late 1991. Despite early hesitation over its pop leaning sound, the song reached No. 3 and became one of Tillis’ defining recordings, earning a Grammy nomination. Put Yourself in My Place went gold.
This time she stayed with country. Homeward Looking Angel followed, then the platinum Sweetheart’s Dance. In 1994 Tillis won CMA Female Vocalist of the Year.
Being Mel Tillis’ daughter could have been her shortest road into country music, yet failure helped her find a country sound that did not belong to her father. She took the long road away and came back sounding like a woman who had earned her own place in the story.