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Pretty good set of songs – “Ruby Ann” was evidence of just how versatile an artist was Marty Robbins – not one of my Robbins’ favorites but still an excellent song
“Wild and Blue” is one of my favorite John Anderson records, and “Don’t Let Our Love Start Slippin’ Away” would easily be one of my Top 5 favorite Vince Gill songs.
“Don’t Let the Stars Get In Your Eyes” ranks as one of country music’s all-time most successful songs. In 1952-53 four different versions became hits. Writer Slim Willet recorded the song in Abilene, Texas in early 1952 with his band The Brush Cutters. First released on his own “Slim Willet” record label it was picked up by the Four Star imprint for national release when the song gained significant regional popularity. Slim’s recording climbed to #1 on Billboard’s Disc Jockey survey the first week of December 1952. Ray Price recorded the song at Nashville’s Castle Studio on September 16, 1952. His Columbia single peaked at #4 on the Billboard Best Seller survey on December 20, 1952. During the final week of that year West Coast based Skeets McDonald began a three week stay at the top of Billboard’s Jukebox chart with his Capitol Recording made in Hollywood on August 11, 1952. Red Foley covered the song for Decca at an October 3, 1952 session at Nashville’s Castle Studio. His heavily orchestrated pop flavored arrangement peaked at #8 on the Best Seller survey in mid-January 1953. Johnnie & Jack came a bit too late to the party. Their RCA Victor single recorded in Nashville on October 17, 1952 failed to chart. Perry Como made the song into a mainstream hit that spent five weeks atop the Billboard pop survey starting in January 1953. The Red Foley recording and versions by Gisele MacKenzie & Eileen Barton also briefly charted pop.
Marty Robbins’ return to the rock & roll sound that had paid off so well for him during the late 1950’s earned him another #1 hit this week in 1963. Marty recorded two versions of “Ruby Ann” several months apart at Columbia studios in Nashville. The first session on March 7, 1962 featured Bill Pursell on piano and Grady Martin’s lead guitar. Attempting to improve on that performance Marty returned to the studio on June 25, 1962 with Boots Randolph joining the session for a different arrangement that included a saxophone intro & solo. However the earlier recording was selected for Marty’s single follow-up to “Devil Woman.” It became his ninth number one hit. The remainder of 1963 proved frustrating for Marty with two singles that peaked in the lower teens while two others missed the Billboard chart completely. He didn’t fully rebound until more than a full year later when “Begging To You” climbed to number one in February 1964.
Despite its great success “Ruby Ann” was not released on a Marty Robbins album until October 1969 when a reprocessed stereo version was issued on the Harmony Records album “Singing The Blues” (HS 11338). Harmony was a subsidiary of Columbia Records that issued budget priced compilations of previously released material by artists from Columbia & their associated labels . A true stereo mix of the song was finally liberated from the Columbia vaults for Bear Family’s 1991 Marty Robbins CD “Ruby Ann” (BCD 15569). That collection also included the previously unreleased second version of “Ruby Ann” featuring the sax.
Ray Price began the 1970’s with the biggest hit of his career “For The Good Times.” Subsequent singles recorded in the same “Nashville Sound” style continued his career resurgence. “I Won’t Mention It Again” spent three weeks at #1 in May 1971 and the follow-up “I’d Rather Be Sorry” peaked at #2 that October. In June 1972 his version of the Mac Davis song “The Lonesomest Lonesome” also peaked at #2. As 1972 drew to a close Ray returned to the top of the chart during final week of that year and retained the #1 spot for the first two weeks of 1973 with “She’s Got To Be A Saint.”