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Although filled with remakes Conway’s country album debut is great listening with a style reflective of country music of that era. Conway and his producer Owen Bradley wanted to clearly show country fans that Conway had fully transitioned from rock & roll to country music.
My favorite track is the ballad issued as Conway’s first Decca country single in 1965. “Together Forever” was written by Conway and features a superb steel guitar lead by Pete Drake. That excellent recording failed to gain traction at country radio and did not chart.
The flip side of that single was another Conway penned song “That Kind Of Girl.” Perhaps had that song been promoted as the “A” side it could have broken out as country radio always had a surplus of ballads to choose from. This song has a catchy Buck Owens/Bakersfield vibe that was very popular at the time.
Musically both songs are top notch so the assumption can be made that Conway’s rock & roll roots cast doubt about his commitment to the genre. Skeptical country radio programmers may have been apprehensive to give him a shot. That is likely the reason that Conway did not rock a bit harder on “Honky Tonk Man.” He wanted to be taken seriously as a country artist so pushing the envelope at that time was not an option. Even so I think he turned in a strong performance on that track with a cool twangy lead guitar solo.
I did not like “I’ll Just Have A Cup Of Coffee” as much as Razor did. Conway does a nice job but I think that song works much better at a faster tempo the way that Claude Gray performed the hit version. But perhaps because I’m so used to Gray’s version that Conway’s drags a bit by comparison. However Conway’s version of “Wine” pretty much mirrored the arrangement on Mel Tillis’ 1965 hit. It’s a good cover although nothing innovative was added. Same can be said for his take on Ray Price’s 1965 hit “The Other Woman.” He did change up Bill Anderson & Ray Price’s 1959 hit “That’s What It’s Like To Be “Lonesome” slightly by adding an excellent extended harmony line on the word “lonesome.”
All in all if you are a fan of Conway’s early country sound this LP will be completely satisfying. However I can’t say how disappointed I was when this album was finally issued on CD in 2010 on the Poker label by Cherry Red Records in the UK. It was released as a “two-fer” along with Conway’s second Decca LP “Look Into My Teardrops” Because the Decca master tapes were incinerated in the 2008 Universal Studios tape vault fire alternative audio sources were necessary. Unfortunately less than pristine vinyl records with excessive distortion were dubbed for many tracks. Better quality records do exist but they failed to find them. Considering that Poker charged a top line price for this CD I believe that the consumer was cheated. My complaint emails to the label at that time went unanswered.
To be clear although Conway’s #1 rock & roll hit “It’s Only Make Believe” did not appear on the Billboard country chart it did spend 18 weeks on the Cashbox country survey where it peaked at #4. Eight weeks of it’s chart life was inside the top ten so Conway’s MGM record did receive extensive airplay on the Cashbox surveyed stations. After Conway began to have country hits in the 1960’s many country stations added that song to their oldies rotations. “‘Lonely Blue Boy” and “Danny Boy” were also included at some country stations as Conway’s country fame grew.
Wonderful response, Ken! Thank you very much.
So sad to learn the Decca master tapes are lost forever.
I was also quite disappointed when I bought that Poker CD and had a short e-mail contact with one of the producers.
Anyway, in 2015 I managed to track down a nice copy of Conway’s first album and did a needle drop for my personal collection. Doesn’t sound necessarily better but… different.
A few months ago I got in touch again with the guy who read the liner notes because I wanted to borrow him my vinyl album for a possible re-issue but he told me that he is no longer involved in the project.
Most of Conway’s early Decca albums were not released in the UK, so they may have had difficulties in obtaining good copies. Generally I really liked Twitty’s first ten Decca albums. This is the first in string of really good albums.