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Every cowboy worth his white hat had a sidekick- Roy Rogers and Gabby Hayes, The Lone Ranger and Tonto, Matt Dillon and Chester and now, Mickey Gilley and Joey Riley. Never mind that Gilley wears a rhinestone studded jacket and Joey Riley, a quirky Japanese-styled hat that as a flowerpot. Their onstage camaraderie at the Mickey Gilley Theater is the clincher.
Mickey Gilley, known as Mr. Urban Cowboy, recognized Riley's naive humor the first time he heard him pull off joke over eight years ago at Jim Owen's Morning Show. The honky-tonk legend remembers that Owen asked his band members to each name a singing cowboy. First one, then another, called out, "Gene Autry, Roy Rogers, Tex Ritter." Riley jumped up like an unblessed child. In his Texas twang, he protested, "Hey! You didn't let me name a cowboy." Owen answered, "You're a little young, Joey, to know these singing cowboys." Riley retorted: "I know all of them!" Owen challenged him to name one. "Roger Staubach!" he yelled out. "Right then, I knew he was good," Gilley says. "That joke knocked my funny bone clear to the floor." The country crooner hired Riley on the spot.
A serious musician on fiddle and steel guitar, Riley's natural comedy gradually filtered into Gilley's show format and appears to the audience as ad-lib. "Joey's a wonderful musician and a natural with comedy," Gilley says. "His unassuming interruptions deviate from the script, keeping the show fresh. But we know where we're headed with it." |
