678 Floyd Tillman (1914-2003) and his Favorite Playboys “They Took the Stars Out of Heaven” 1941

“the songwriting high priest of hurtin’ and cheatin’ anthems was clearly Floyd Tillman. Tillman was born in 1914 in Ryan, Oklahoma, but grew up in Post, Garza County, Texas. As a teenager, Floyd got his musical education playing mandolin and then guitar in a family band. He later purchased a guitar with a metal resonator that provided acoustic amplification. After relocating to Houston in 1934, Tillman added an electric pickup to his guitar, and when he recorded with the Blue Ridge Playboys in 1936, Floyd’s electrified guitar licks made him of one of the earliest exponents of the instrument on record and placed him in the electric vanguard that was beginning to sweep through Texas and the Southwest” (Joe W. Specht, Southwestern American Literature, Fall 2016).

Floyd Tillman and his Favorite Playboys “They Took the Stars Out of Heaven”