Live Fast, Love Hard, Die Young
"This was a tune I detested", Young said. "Ken Nelson made me record this song. I put it out and it was a big, big hit. Then I got to liking it." The song mentions a Wampus cat.
The song idea came to Joe Allison while watching a gangster movie starring a young John Derek. Allison explained, "All through this picture he said, 'I want to die young and leave a good-looking corpse.' It struck me as a good idea for a song, so I wrote 'Live Fast, Love Hard, Die Young.' I didn't write it for anybody, but when Ken Nelson heard it, he said, 'We'll do that with Faron Young.'"
Background
"Live Fast, Love Hard, Die Young" was Faron Young's first number-one song and his fifth consecutive top ten hit.