Me and Bobby McGee - guitar chords and comments
Lyrics without distraction HERE
Kris has always been most credited as a songwriter. Stumbling into Nashville music industry late sixties, he carried with him a bunch of potential hits. Roger Miller recorded this first, Gordon Lightfoot next, and so on. Finally Janis Joplin captured it. He and Janis dated at that time, but he didn't hear the result until the day after her death. It appeared to be her last recording.
When Kris finally signed with Monument to record his own material, he included this one - co-written by the label's founder Fred Foster - in his debut album "Kristofferson" (1971); later reissued as "Me and Bobby McGee" after Janis' passing - and grumbles as an intro: "If it sounds country folks; that's what it is. It's a country song. Hmmm ... one, two, three, four ..."
Kris was about to end up in the US Marines or as an academical zombie. Fortunately, he didn't.