Country music from a fan's point of view since 2008
Note: I never owned this album on vinyl so I am working off a CD released on MCA Special Products in 1991, The songs are the same as on the initial vinyl release but the sequence of the songs is different on the CD.
Issued in June 1970, Hello Darlin’ was the ninth solo studio album released by Conway Twitty on Decca. The album was Conway’s first #1 country album and was eventually certified “Gold”. It also reached #65 on Billboard’s all genres chart, the highest that any of Conway’s country albums would reach, although reporting of country albums on the all-genres chart was very suspect and country albums were frequently under-reported by record shop personnel.
The CD opens with the Felice & Boudreaux Bryant classic “Rocky Top”. At the time, “Rocky Top” was a fairly new song that had not been covered to death. The Osborne Brothers had a hit with the song in 1968 and the combination of Doug Dillard, Gene Clark and Donna Washburn had a really nice version of the song on a Dillard & Clark album from that same year. Conway’s version has a banjo on it with what is otherwise an up-tempo Nashville production. Needless to say, Conway sings the song very well although he changes the words very slightly to accommodate his own phrasing.
Next up is “I’ll Get Over Losing You” a song written by Conway, a somewhat generic ballad about lost love. As always Conway sings it well, making for pleasant listening.
Conway also penned “Up Comes The Bottle” a mid-tempo song about the effects of alcohol. It’s a good song, well sung by Conway
Up comes the bottle and down goes the man
I can’t help him but I can understand
When up comes the bottle
And down, down, down, goes the man.
You may find him anywhere there’s heartache and despair
With loneliness so heavy you can feel it in the air
And the only thing that matters is the drink in his hand
Then up comes the bottle
And down, down, down, goes the man.
Bill Anderson wrote “You and Your Sweet Love”, which charted for Connie Smith in 1969, While I prefer Connie’s version, it would have made a good Conway Twitty single, one of many such songs stranded as album tracks on the early Conway Twitty albums. I seem to recall that Connie Smith wrote the liner notes for the vinyl album’s back cover.
The self-penned “Hello Darlin’” is the song for which Conway is best remembered, although “It’s Only Make Believe” was a huge pop hit in 1958 and by far his biggest seller. “Hello Darlin’“ reached #1 and stayed there for four weeks. The song is about a man who runs into an old flame, reigniting old feelings in the process. This was the only single released from the album.
Hello darlin’
Nice to see you
It’s been a long time
You’re just as lovely
As you used to be
How’s your new love
Are you happy?
Hope you’re doin’ fine
Just to know means so much to me
What’s that darlin’
How am I doin’?
I’m doin’ alright
Except I can’t sleep
I cry all night ’til dawn
What I’m tryin’ to say is
I love you and I miss you
And I’m so sorry
That I did you wrong
Conway would revisit the theme with his next single “Fifteen Years Ago”. I saw Conway in concert several times before this song was released and several times after. From 1971 onward, this was his opening number and “It’s Only Make Believe” his closing number, perfect bookends for a great show.
“Rose” (not to be mistaken for the maudlin Amanda McBroom composition “The Rose” that Bette Midler would record later and Conway would cover) was written by L.E. White, a staff writer for Conway’s publishing company. This song is a ballad about a brother whose sister has strayed off-track in life.
“Reuben James” was a top thirty pop hit for Kenny Rogers and The First Edition (it went top ten in Canada, New Zealand and Australia) that was covered by a large number of American country artists. This is a nice mid-tempo track.
Bill Anderson also wrote “I Never Once Stopped Loving You”, which reached #5 for Connie Smith in 1970, Again, I prefer Connie’s version, but Conway does a nice job with this ballad
It is difficult to find a country album of the late 1960s-early 1970s that does not contain a Dallas Frazier composition. This album features “Will You Visit Me On Sundays” which was a top twenty single for Charlie Louvin in 1968, and the title track of a 1970 George Jones album. I can’t say that Conway’s version is better than Charlie Louvin or George Jones (the lyric seems perfect for Charlie’s weathered voice) but this would have made a good Conway Twitty single.
Just outside these prison bars
The hanging tree is waitin’
At sunrise I’ll meet darkness
And death will say hello
Darling, touch your lips to mine
And tell me you love me
Promise me again before you go
Will you visit me on Sundays?
Will you bring me pretty flowers?
Will your big blue eyes be misty?
Will you brush away a tear?
Fred Rose write the classic “Blue Eyes Crying in The Rain”, a song that both Hank Williams and Rof Acuff had recorded. Since Willie Nelson had yet to record this song (Willie’s version would be released in 1975), this was not a cover of somebody else’s hit single, but simply case of Conway going “deep catalog” in finding a song that he liked. Conway’s version is not the sparse recording that Willie released but a normal Owen Bradley production applied to a classic Fred Rose composition from the 1940s.
The album closes with “I’m So Used To Loving You”, the fourth of Conway’s own compositions on the album. This is a good song that somebody somewhere should have released as a single.
I’m so used to loving you sweetheart
You’re on my mind each minute we’re apart
And I love you more each day that we go through
You’re my life and I’ll live it loving you
I’m so used to loving you it seems
I can’t stand the thought of losing you not even in my dream
Hold me close and tell me what I’d do without you
I couldn’t take it, I’m so used to loving you
Conway Twitty was a good and prolific songwriter who would use his own compositions on his albums, but, unlike some singer-songwriters, only if they were good songs. Through this album, the highest number of Conway Twitty and/or Mickey Jaco compositions on an album was four. There would be one future album in which he wrote eight of the ten songs (there must be a story behind this since it is a complete outlier) and several on which he wrote one or none of the songs
None of the Conway Twitty compositions that I’ve ever heard were duds, and many of them fell in the very good-to-great category
This album is a solid A with solid country production throughout
There’s something very special about the harmonies created by two brothers. One of the best duos in modern bluegrass or country music consists of the Gibson Brothers, Leigh and Eric. in their latest release, they pay tribute to some of the great fraternal partnerships of the past, and the result is sublime.
Their version of the Everly Brothers’ big pop hit ‘Bye Bye Love’ is darker and more melancholy than the perky original, drawing on the implicit sadness of the Felice/Boudleaux Bryant lyric. Another Everlys cut, ‘Crying In The Rain’ showcases the pair’s compelling vocals on a tune written by iconic pop singer-songwriter Carole King.
The haunting ‘Long Time Gone’ (also once recorded by the Everlys) is another standout. The similarly titled but pacier ‘Long Gone’ comes from the same writer, Leslie York of the York Brothers, a sibling duo active in the 1940s and 50s.
‘The Sweetest Gift’, a beautiful story about a mother visiting a prisoner son, has been recorded by everyone from the Blue Sky Boys in the 40s to the Judds. The Gibson Brothers’ version is wonderful, imbued with the tenderness and desperation of the mother’s love for her “erring, but precious son”, and stands up against any of the previous versions, with an interesting arrangement of their harmonies. ‘Eastbound Train’ also deals with a prisoner’s loved one, and is a traditionally styled ballad telling the sweetly sentimental story of a little girl taking the train to seek a pardon for her father, who is not only in prison but also blind. The conductor is moved by her sad story and lets her travel for free.
Also very much in traditional vein, the Louvin Brothers’ melancholy ‘Seven Year Blues’ is outstanding.
‘I’m Troubled, I’m Troubled’ picks up the pace with a jaundiced lyric, while the perky ‘Sweet Little Miss Blue Eyes’ brightens the mood. A tender ‘It’ll Be Her’ (a hit for Tompall and the Glaser Brothers) is gorgeous.
The Gibsons are joined by Ronnie Reno, a onetime member of the Osborne Brothers’ band, to sing ‘Each Season Changes You’, a pretty plaintive song popularised by the latter. Reno also helps out on the upbeat ‘How Mountain Girls Can Love’.
‘I Have Found The Way’ is traditional bluegrass gospel, written by Bill Monroe’s brother Charlie and recorded by the Monroes in 1937,before Bill invented bluegrass as a discrete genre. Ronnie and Rob McCoury join the Gibsons on a sincere ‘What A Wonderful Savior Is He’. The lesser known ‘An Angel With Blue Eyes’ anticipates reunion in heaven with a loved one, an dis sung with commitment.
The combination of compelling harmonies and great songs, backed by tasteful bluegrass arrangements make this an essential putrchase.
Grade: A+
“Because you see, we live what we sing. Or, put another way, we sing what we live In telling things as they are, in being what we are, we are true to our ‘raising’ – to the small town and rural American values we take for granted . These values are heavily religious, but they are also heavily patriotic. They are highly moral, but they are also very human … It reflects life as life is lived. But we are not deceived into thinking that it is right.”
— Hit The Glory Road, Broadman Press, 1969
Bobby Lord was a genuine country music star in his time, one whose career could not duplicated in today’s environment.
Consider this: Columbia issued 18 singles on Bobby Lord without ever releasing an album. Of these singles, only his seventh, “Without Your Love,” released in 1956, charted on Billboard’s Country Chart (reaching #10), though most of them sold very well in the South, with several becoming huge sellers. Since the charts prior to 1958 went only 15-20 places deep and Lord’s records were selling only regionally, it’s not surprising that they didn’t chart. Despite this, several of the records sold over 250,000 copies, with “Hawkeye” (written by Boudleaux Bryant) being the biggest hit, although “Swamp Fox” and “Pie Peachy Pie” are also well remembered–all of Lord’s Columbia singles fetch high prices from collectors.
Bobby Lord was born in Sanford, Florida (between Orlando and Daytona Beach) but grew up in the Tampa area where he began his career as a teenager. While a freshman at the University of Tampa, he starred in his own television show, The Bobby Lord Homefolks Show, which ran for an hour on Saturday nights. From there he landed a guest appearance on Paul Whiteman’s TV show in New York. For those not familiar with Whiteman, he was the biggest recording star of the 1920s, from whose band such future stars as Bing Crosby, Jack Teagarden, Bix Beiderbeck and Tommy Dorsey emerged.
In 1953, songwriter Boudleaux Bryant gave an assist to Lord’s career by playing a tape of his recordings for Don Law at Columbia records, who signed Lord to the label. As mentioned previously, Lord recorded several regional hits in both the rockabilly and country idioms. At the same time, he became a regular on The Ozark Jubilee (ABC television show starring Red Foley, based out of Springfield, Missouri), where he stayed for five and a half years. Lord also made his first guest appearance on the Grand Ole Opry in 1954 and appeared occasionally thereafter.
The Ozark Jubilee went off the air in 1960, so Bobby Lord moved to Nashville, joining the Grand Ole Opry that same year, where he remained active until the mid 70s. In 1961 he began recording for the Hickory label, where he had his first National hit in eight years with “Life Can Have Meaning”. In 1967, he moved to Decca, where had seven charted hits, with the biggest being “You and Me Against The World” (not the same song as the Helen Reddy hit) and “Wake Me Up Early In The Morning”. While with Decca, Lord released one album, and during this period he hosted the nationally syndicated Bobby Lord Show, which was seen in 40 markets in the U.S. and 34 countries around the world. He also had a late afternoon live country TV show on WSMV
After his Decca contract expired, Bobby Lord more or less retired from the music business, returning to his native Florida to sell real estate. When The Nashville Network (TNN) came into being, he hosted Country Sportsman (later called Celebrity Outdoors) and made occasional guest appearances on other TNN shows. After 1990 Lord was largely retired from show business.
Bobby Lord was a deeply religious man, and his 1969 book Hit The Glory Road remains as fascinating to read today as it was when first published. The book includes interviews with such notables as Roy Acuff, Bill Anderson, Boudleaux & Felice Bryant, Skeeter Davis, Jake Hess and Tex Ritter, discussing their concepts of religion, morality and country music, as well as relaying a number of truly funny stories. Read more of this post
One of the hottest male-female duet acts of the early 80s, David Frizzell and Shelly West released four studio albums together. None of them ever had a CD release, nor are they currently in print. However, this 2009 anthology includes all of their big hits, plus a few misses and some key alubm cuts, and provides a more than adequate overview of their duet career.
The younger brother of Lefty Frizzell, David had had a singles deal with Columbia from 1970 to 1976. Only one of those recordings, 1970’s “I Just Can’t Stop Believin'” (not included in this collection) cracked the Top 40; the rest languished in obscurity on the lower rungs of the charts. His younger brother Allen joined his band in 1977. Alan had been the lead guitarist for Dottie West, and had married West’s daughter Shelly. Shelly began performing with David, and eventually they caught the attention of producer Snuff Garrett. Their big break came in 1981 when their recording of “You’re The Reason God Made Oklahoma” was included in the Clint Eastwood film Any Which Way You Can. The song was written by the legendary Felice and Boudleaux Bryant, along with Larry Collins and Sandy Pinkard. It reached the #1 spot on the Billboard country singles chart. It was the duo’s biggest hit, telling the story of a couple dealing with a painful separation when one of them leaves their hometown for the bright lights of the big city. It’s a theme that the duo would explore a number of times, beginning with their follow-up hit “Texas State of Mind”, which peaked at #9 and the following year’s “Another Honky-tonk Night On Broadway”, which reached #8. Of the three songs, it isn’t difficult to see why “Oklahoma” is the best-remembered (the other two have been virtually forgotten); it is the best-written of the three songs and also managed to avoid some of the early 80s production excesses that marred the other two records; there is a somewhat intrusive string section on “Texas State of Mind”. While this is less of a problem on “Broadway”, “Oklahoma” sounds the least dated and would stand a reasonable chance at success today with very little tinkering to the arrangement.
In between “Texas State of Mind” and “Another Honky-tonk Night on Broadway”, Frizzell and West did an excellent cover version of Roger Miller’s “Husbands and Wives”, which peaked at #16. One of Miller’s more serious efforts, his original 1966 version had reached #5, as well as reaching #26 on the Hot 100. Brooks & Dunn would cover it again in 1998 and take it all the way to #1 on the country charts. Their version also reached the Hot 100, peaking at #36.
Frizzell and West stopped recording together after 1985. It was speculated that West’s acrimonious divorce from Allen Frizzell was a contributing factor, but the rest of the songs in this collection — and their performances on the charts — suggest that the official reason, a lack of good duet material, was probably the truth. The duo had only one more Top 10 hit, 1982’s “I Just Came Here To Dance”, a cover of an R&B hit by Peabo Bryson and Roberta Flack. The Frizzell and West version is barely country, yet managed to reach #4. Their next release, the decent but somewhat overproduced “Please Surrender” only reached #43. 1983’s “Cajun Invitation” was a song that I liked a lot when it was first released, but it sounds very cheesy today. The duo reached the Top 20 two more times in 1984 with the beautiful “Silent Partners” and “It’s a Be-Together Night”. Their final single together “Do Me Right”, released in 1985, failed to chart at all.
Also included in this collection are some very good non-single releases. “Carryin’ On The Family Names”, which was the title track of their first duet album, name checks other stars such as Hank Williams Jr., Rex Allen Jr., Debby Boone, and Crystal Gayle, who, like David and Shelly, were trying to emerge from the shadows of their more famous relatives. Also quite good is a medey of “The Wild Side of Life” and “It Wasn’t God Who Made Honky-tonk Angels” which are performed as a single song, much like Waylon Jennings and Jessi Colter had earlier done. Missing the mark entirely, however is a cover version of the 1963 Ruby and the Romantics’ R&B hit “Our Day Will Come.”
The collection does not include any of David or Shelly’s solo hits, which is a shame, because there is sufficient room on the disc for “I’m Gonna Hire a Wino To Decorate Our Home”, “Lost My Baby Blues”, “Jose Cuervo” and “Flight 309 To Tennessee”. It does, however, include one solo performance by Shelly of “I Just Fall In Love Again”, which is very good, though it does not compare with Anne Murray’s version that topped the country charts for three weeks in 1979.
David and Shelly’s careers — as a duo and as solo artists — were largely over before the CD era, so very little of their work was ever released in that format. This collection appears to about the best that is currently available, and will suffice for all but the most die-hard fans.
Grade: B+
Emmylou Harris’s debut for Reprise was an artistic masterpiece which stands up well today. Recorded in LA with Canadian producer Brian Ahern, who Emmylou was to marry a few years later, it brought in the influences of the California country-rock scene in which Emmylou had been immersed during her time with Gram Parsons, fusing them with some very traditional music. The musicians included Herb Pedersen (later a member of the Desert Rose Band) as the principal harmony singer, the Eagles’ Bernie Leadon playing a variety of instruments, soon-to-be Hot Band members James Burton and Glen D Hardin, and Fayssoux Starling, wife of John Starling of the bluegrass group The Seldom Scene as the main female harmony voice. Emmylou herself played acoustic guitar on a number of tracks.
Her first country single was the beautiful lost love ballad ‘Too Far Gone’. Written by Billy Sherrill and given a delicate string arrangement reminiscent of his work with Tammy Wynette (who had also recorded the song), it failed to make any inroads for Emmylou despite an intense yet understated performance imbued with anguish. It was re-released in 1978 to promote the compilation Profile, and then reached #13.
Gram Parsons had introduced Emmylou to the music and perfect harmonies of the Louvin Brothers, and a sparkling reading of their ‘If I Could Only Win Your Love’ was her first big hit, peaking at #4 on Billboard. Pedersen plays banjo here as well as supplying perfect harmonies, making this a true classic recording which stands up to the original.
Emmylou herself wrote just one song, the exquisitely beautiful ‘Boulder To Birmingham’, reflecting on her grief for the death of Gram Parsons. With echoes of gospel in the lyrics and folk in the melody (supplied by co-writer Bill Danoff) and arrangement, Emmylou provides a worthy tribute to her mentor which exudes sorrow. Perhaps in another tribute to their work together, she also covered the Everly Brothers’ ‘Sleepless Nights’ (a Felice and Boudleaux Bryant song most recently revived by Patty Loveless), which she had previously cut with Gram for their second album together, Grievous Angel, but which had been omitted from the final version.
It was still common practice in the 1970s for artists to cover recent hits. Emmylou picked Dolly Parton’s autobiographical ‘Coat Of Many Colors’ (a hit for her in 1971), and this tenderly sung version with its mainly acoustic backing and the angelic harmonies of Fayssoux Starling, is convincing even though her own background was far from the rural poverty which inspired the song. She also sounds beautiful if mournful on the Beatles’ ‘For No One’.
It wasn’t all delicate ballads. The good-tempered mid-tempo wailed drinking song ‘Bluebird Wine’ which opens the album is actually my least favorite track vocally, but gets things off to a sparkling start instrumentally. It is notable as the first ever cut for the then-unknown Rodney Crowell, who Emmylou was soon to ask to join the Hot Band. There are committed honky tonk numbers in a spunky cover of Merle Haggard’s broken hearted ‘Bottle Let Me Down’ with Leadon and Pedersen singing backing, although this doesn’t quite match up to the original. Emmylou also sang the definitive version of Shel Silverstein’s sympathetic (even triumphant) portrait of a faded honky tonk angel he calls the ‘Queen Of The Silver Dollar’ (previously recorded by Dr Hook and a hit for Dave & Sugar in 1976). Linda Ronstadt and Herb Pedersen sang harmony on Emmylou’s version.
Another future Hot Band Member, Ricky Skaggs, guests on fiddle on ‘Queen Of the Silver Dollar’, and fiddle and viola on ‘Before Believing’, a pretty acoustic ballad with a folky feel, written by Danny Flowers. Emmylou’s boyfriend at the time, Tom Guidera, plays bass on these two tracks. The latter provides the album title:
How would you feel if the world was falling apart all around you
Pieces of the sky falling on your neighbor’s yard but not on you
The album sold well, reaching #7 on the country albums chart, and was eventually certified hold. It has been rereleased on CD, both with the original track listing and in 2004 with two additional songs, ‘Hank And Lefty (Raised My Country Soul)’, which had been a minor hit for the African-American country singer Stoney Edwards a few years earlier, and ‘California Cottonfields’ (a Haggard album cut written by Dallas Frazier and Earl Montgomery)). Both are fine songs well performed by Emmylou, and it is well worth seeking out this version for those songs (or downloading them individually if you already have the album).
Grade: A
Buy it at amazon.
My Kind of Country 