As before mentioned, the song came out in 1973 on Roy’s Rebel Records album, HIGH COUNTRY. At some point, Lowell Varney and Landon Messer heard the song and began to do it. They may have even recorded it. Ralph Stanley heard their version and picked it up for himself. He had no idea who wrote the song and just assumed that Varney/Messer wrote it (they both did write many songs), so when he recorded it in 1981, he mistakenly listed them as writers. And of course, that mistake continued until the LRB recording, when it was brought to Roy McMillan’s attention. Unfortunately, this sort of thing happened all too often back in those days.

I’ve not heard the Roy McMillan version (yet), but from the quoted lyrics, it’s the same song.

Great song!!

“When you go walking after midnight
Over on the wrong side of town.
Go down any street, many wandering souls you meet.
Who’s lives are broken like mine”

Roy called the song “Wandering in the Darkness”. It was on a 1973 Rebel Records album SLP-1517 called HIGH COUNTRY, Roy McMillan and the High Country Boys.

If this is the same song, the Stanley Brothers never recorded it. Ralph may have covered it in the ’70s, after Roy put it out.

When the LRB came out with this song……with it credited to Lowell Varney……I spoke with Bill Vernon about it. Bill confirmed that Roy McMillan did indeed write the song. That is why the credits were changed on the second printing of the LRB album.

Other than that, I don’t know anything about it. Maybe it’s a different song altogether!

Thank you for taking the time to read my article, and for bringing your concern to our attention.

According to my research, no fewer than 29 song lyrics sites credit the Stanley Brothers with having recorded the song, “When You Go Walking After Midnight.” This includes sites like metrolyrics.com, which is owned by CBS Interactive Music Group in cooperation with Billboard magazine and others, and is considered by many to be the go-to site for fans and professionals.

This notwithstanding, I did look deeper into the question and found that at the very least, Ralph Stanley and the Clinch Mountain Boys recorded the song on a collection called Sixteen Years, for the Copper Creek label.

Unfortunately for Mr. McMillan, every single resource I checked does credit Mr. Varney as the songwriter, so the Lonesome River Band was not the first or only act to make that listing.

I will continue to look into the point, and will be more than glad to make any changes where error exists, including if Ralph was the only Stanley to record the song.

Thank you again for expressing your concerns; I invite you to do so at any time.

Shannon Turner

When the song was included on an LRB recording back in the early ’90s, it was wrongly credited as being written by Lowell Varney. This mistake was quite painful to Roy McMillan, so I wanted to correct it here quickly.