My 100 Favorite Charted Country Songs: Eleven Roses

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The other day I promised you that you’d be seeing the singer of the song back…as a songwriter. Well, here you go! And I suppose I’ll have to do a lot of reassuring to you throughout this discussion, because you probably WON’T believe that screen grab and the singer is who I say it is. No, it’s not April Fools Day. It really is him. Eleven Roses - Hank Williams Jr. YES, that’s Bocephus. If you’re not a country music fan from way back, or are under, say 50, you’ve never seen him like that. You see, in 1975, Williams was mountain climbing in Montana (on Ajax Mountain). The snow shifted and he fell, face first, 500 feet. He lost an eye, suffered multiple skull fractures, and needed over a dozen facial reconstruction surgeries. The “look” you’re familiar with is to hide the nearly 50-year-old scars. The fact that he’s even ALIVE today is a miracle. As for the songwriter, we have, making a return appearance, Darrell McCall (who sang the earlier song “Dreams of a Dreamer”). He said he got the idea from sending his mom eleven roses for her birthday and telling her, “If you look in the mirror you’ll see the 12th rose.” Ain’t that sweet?! In the song the roses are sent to compensate for an unspecified sin (“after what I’ve done you may not keep the roses”). It’s delivered in a country style that you probably didn’t know Bocephus was capable of. Yes, it’s really him. And he really did sing authentic country music back then. Eleven Roses Written by Darrell McCall and Lamar Morris Recorded by Hank Williams Jr. From Eleven Roses, 1972 Peak chart position: #1 Today’s rock song: “Honeycomb” They say more than man can say: