The Best Country Albums of 1973, Part 3

David Cantwell on 56 albums either "Worth a Spin Anway..." or filed "For Further Study"

This is the third of a three-part series. Be sure to check out Part 1 and Part 2.

The reason a 1973 country album might be “Worth a Spin Anyway…” is varied. Could be because it includes a cut or two or three that still holds up but is otherwise an uneven effort—and maybe not even that good. Could be because an album had a big hit—maybe a strong one, maybe not—that I need to know and to have considered if I’m calling myself a country critic familiar with the genre’s actual recorded history rather than some received version of it. Or it could be a down-period release by a major, or a once major, or a minor country figure that I want to know about for the same reasons. The more widely I listen within the genre, the more I’m convinced that the genre does much of its work—creates meaning, establishes a repertoire, defines itself, and re-defines itself again and again—with the music and musicians I call non-canonical country (see the intro to Part 1), and there are tons of those among the dozens of country and country-adjacent albums included here. Your mileage may vary.

*****

Worth a Spin Anyway…

Lynn Anderson Top of the World and Keep Me in Mind – A batch of pop and country-pop covers, including “The Night the Lights Went Out in Georgia” and a nice version of “Killing Me Softly.” The Carpenters-cover title track went #2, “Sing about Love” to #3 and “Keep Me in Mind” topped the chart. Both sets were Top Ten country albums.

Atlanta Rhythm Section Back Up Against the Wall – “Cold Turkey, Tenn.,” “Back up Against the Wall,” a nice version of Joe South’s “Redneck.

The Band Moondog Matinee – A fun collection of roots music covers, another foundational document for what we now term Americana.

Bobby Bare I Hate Goodbyes / Ride Me Down Easy – As is often the case with Bare albums in my experience, this album is full of solid songs, solidly done, but the singles are the keepers. This time out that means both title songs, which went to #25 and #11, and “You Know Who,” a real bummer from Shel Silverstein that went to 30.  

Black Oak Arkansas High on the Hog – Hot-and-nasty hillbilly hedonism! “Back to the Land,” “Movin’,” “Jim Dandy.”

Tony Booth This Is Tony Booth – Same sound and producer as the Booth album above, just with what I’m calling weaker songs. “Out of Ways to Try,” “If I Had You Back Again.”

Jim Ed Brown Bar-Rooms and Pop-A-Tops – Drinking songs, mostly, but this particular batch of Jim Ed sides feels both alcohol- and misery-free. Includes the Top Ten “Southern Loving,” which wants to be a kind of “California Girls” for the sunny south. Also includes, for some reason, his original 1967 “Pop a Top,” so I’d order a few rounds of that.

Johnny Cash and June Carter Cash Johnny Cash and His Woman – Like quite a few Cash albums in the seventies, this feels like it was knocked out one afternoon on a drunken whim. His “woman,” as it turns out, only shows up a few times, but just as typically, hers are usually the ones you want: “Color of Love,” “The Pine Tree.” Weirdest moment: “Allegheny,” where June keeps screaming wordlessly.

Billy “Crash” Craddock Two Sides of Crash and Mr. Country Rock – On the naughty dad-joke fast ones that became his specialty, Crash is like Elvis-lite, right down to the jumpsuit: The Top Ten “Till the Water Stops Runnin’” is, I’m assuming, country’s greatest shower-sex song. On the slower ones, he’s like Conway-lite, right down to the growl: “Afraid I’ll Want to Love Her One More Time.” If you’re up for it, Two Sides… includes an appropriately white-bread cover of Merle’s “I’m a White Boy.”

Mac Davis Mac Davis – Coming between albums far more successful, commercially, and artistically, this one is only RIYL if you like Davis in his MOR-mode a lot already. “Your Side of the Bed” cracked the country Top 40

Skeeter Davis I Can’t Believe That It’s All Over – The beseeching Ben Peters-title track was Davis’s final Top 20 country hit, and even “Bubbled Under” pop. Unexpected: Skeeter’s take on the J5’s “I’ll Be There.”

John Denver Farewell Andromeda – A negligible pop hit, “I’d Rather Be a Cowboy” sounds like a duet for Glen Campbell and Elton John. A negligible country hit, “Please Daddy,” written by Denver collaborator Bill Danoff, is the original version of the drunken-daddy Christmas song that became a country standard. Was surprised I liked Denver’s version of “Angel of Montgomery” as much as I did.

Johnny Duncan Sweet Country Woman – The title song marked the Texas crooner’s first (of what would eventually number 10) Top Ten singles.

Larry Gatlin The Pilgrim – Gatlin’s singer-songwriter debut. His voice is quite nice, but his songs lack the gravitas their big and busy arrangements suggest they deserve, and the whole thing comes off like a lot of pretty barking without any bite. On the album’s #40 single, he swears “I’d walk a mile” to have sex with “Sweet Becky Walker,” but unless it’s raining or something, that doesn’t really sound like he’s very committed.

Arlo Guthrie The Last of the Brooklyn Cowboys – Skip Arlo’s originals, and his “Gypsy Davey,” too, and head straight for the Ernest Tubb, Hank Williams, Jimmie Rodgers and Bob Dylan covers.

Wanda Jackson Country Gospel – Her debut for Word, one of Myrrh Records’ gospel affiliates. “Jesus Cares for Me,” “I Know.”

Sonny James If She Just Helps Me Get Over You – Sonny James, whose pleasantly smooth croon has by this point in his Hall of Fame career taken a sharp turn toward the rough-hewn, is a prime example of a singer who is only as good as his material. His heartfelt reading of “Mom and Dad’s Waltz” works well, as does his mocking “Satin Pillows.” Not so good is the title track, but it went to #15, and another dud, “I Love You More and More Everyday,” cracked the Top Five.

Wayne Kemp Kentucky Sunshine – The Arkansas singer-songwriter wrote plenty of gooduns (“One Piece at a Time,” “The Only Hell My Mama Ever Raised,” “Burn Another Honky Tonk Down,” etc.), but never had much commercial luck with his own recordings. “Honky Tonk Wine” was the biggest record of Kemp’s chart career, Top 20, and was written by Mark Vickery, another good songwriter (he co-wrote “The Fireman” with Kemp), who couldn’t buy a hit. “I Sure Need Her Now,” “Burn Another Honky Tonk Down.”

Jerry Lee Lewis Sometimes a Memory Ain’t Enough – Ol’ Jerry Lee refers to himself as “ol’ Jerry Lee” far too often here, and insists we “think about it” every other song, too, which grows tiresome. Top Ten title track, plus a first-rate reading of “What My Woman Can’t Do.”

Little Feat Dixie Chicken – Southern rock plus Nawlins roll. “Dixie Chicken.”

Bob Luman Neither One of Us – Produced by Billy Sherrill-colleague Glenn Sutton, so this sounds fantastic. On the other hand, Sutton’s Merle-off-the-rack “Uncle Sam” kind of pisses me off, and there’s almost always something about Luman’s humorless baritone on these later country sides that keeps me at a distance. The Jim Weatherley title song was a top ten hit.

Loretta Lynn Love Is the Foundation – “Hey Loretta” (rhymes with “Irish setter,” by Shel Silverstein) and “Love Is the Foundation” were two more country chart toppers, and even when the arrangements are a little blah, as they are here mostly, Loretta’s readings are always worth attending to. Note the way she sings “pleasures” in “Why Me Lord.”

Charlie McCoy Good Time Charlie and The Fastest Harp in the South – In the studio McCoy was a multi-instrumentalist—he played the indelible guitar lick on Bobby Bare’s “Detroit City.” But in his solo work, he was a harmonica man who scored minor instrumental hits throughout the decade. On Good Time…, “Orange Blossom Special” and “Shenandoah” both made the Top 40 as did “Release Me” off The Fastest… I’m partial to “Silver Wings” and “You Are the Sunshine of My Life.”

Jody Miller Good News – From her Billy Sherrill era, I prefer Miller’s earlier girl-group-hit country covers. “Good News” (#9) sounds pretty generic. “Darling, You Can Always Come Back” is a little better (#5). Her “Hallelujah, I Love Him So” and “House of the Rising Sun” pass by in that inoffensively weird TV variety-show guest-spot kind of way.

Anne Murray Danny’s Song – Give or take “Songbird,” Murray’s best country work is still ahead of her at this point, but her hit take on Kenny Loggins’ “Danny’s Song” (#10) remains both lovely and country as hell (“Even though we ain’t got money…”), and its follow up, “What about Me” (#20), is solid too. “Danny’s Song” also topped what at the time Billboard still titled its “Easy Listening” chart, a routinely derided but key country-pop intersection that deserves more attention. Side two is from a fairly lifeless live show.

Tracy Nelson Poor Man’s Paradise – Tracy Nelson and Mother Earth mine a roots vein and carry out some country blues. “I Hate to Say Goodbye,” “Going Back to Tennessee,” “You and Me.”

Michael Nesmith Pretty Much Your Standard Ranch Stash – His already-a-standard “Some of Shelley’s Blues,” Cindy Walker’s “Born to Love You.”

Norma Jean The Only Way to Hold Your Man – Her final RCA-Victor album after a decade on the label, here mostly singing other people’s hits. “It’s Not Love (But It’s Not Bad,” “Stoned Again.”

Buck Owens In the Palm of Your Hand and Ain’t It Amazing Gracie – No such thing as a bad Buck Owens album, and both these sets boast his distinctive and irresistible sound. But he was also really cranking them out in these early Hee Haw years, and the songs aren’t much, the arrangements a little familiar. “Made in Japan” topped the charts. “Ain’t It Amazin, Gracie” went to #14. “Streets of Bakersfield,” “When You Get Back from Nashville,” “You Ain’t Gonna Have Ol’ Buck to Kick around No More.”

Ozark Mountain Daredevils Ozark Mountain Daredevils – Could be my age and years of AOR listening, could be I spent too much time in the Ozarks as a boy visiting kin, but that harmonica hook on “If You Wanna Get to Heaven” is like catnip to me.

Johnny Paycheck Mr. Lovemaker and Song and Dance Man – Paycheck and producer Billy Sherrill made some of the greatest country records of all time. These albums don’t include any of them. Still, his miscast title songs were #2 and #8 hits, respectively. “She’ll Unwine Me,” “My Part of Forever,” “Once She Loved Me that Much.”

Elvis Presley Aloha from Hawaii – A couple years earlier, “There Goes My Everything” had returned Elvis to Nashville and to the country charts, but his omnipresence at the format was still a year or so away when he performed (“Via Satellite”) for a worldwide TV audience. It’s telling, then, that the so-called King of Rock & Roll leans into the country here, covering Don Gibson (via Ray Charles), Marty Robbins, Hank Williams (“Probably the saddest song I’ve ever heard”), and Jim Reeves. His voice had weakened at this point so on the rockers, especially on stage, his genius is diminished, but country ballads gave him room to breathe.

Elvis Presley Elvis (aka Elvis 1973) – Country ballad “Fool,” with J.D. Sumner & the Stamps, was Top 40 country that heralded his string of Top Tens ahead. I’m one of those people who think Elvis’ seventies albums are too often dismissed, but even I don’t play this one very often. “(That’s What You Get) For Lovin’ Me” (with the Nashville Edition), “Don’t Think Twice, It’s Alright.”

Jerry Reed The Uptown Poker Club – Reed’s great early run really begins to nosedive starting right here. Still, plenty of interesting stuff, including a version of “Everybody Has Those Kind of Days” (another young Rodney Crowell song) and a country-funky take on Sophie Tucker-signature “Some of These Days.” Guitar Man at his best: the instrumental “Honkin’.” Not so much: Both the title track (a #25 country hit) and “Nobody” are hick-face remakes of numbers written and made famous by vaudeville giant Bert Williams. Bonus points for the Jack Davis cover illustration.

Diana Ross Last Time I Saw Him – The first time I heard the story of “Last Time I Saw Him” (an easy listening chart topper and #14 pop hit), I thought, “This is like a country song!” And that was before the banjo kicked in. Her “Behind Closed Doors” is good, too.

Johnny Russell Catfish John / Chained – Title tracks went to #12 and #31, respectively.

Leon Russell Hank Wilson’s Back – This always hits me as being a better idea than a record. I wish Russell had encouraged the Nashville cats here to cut loose or at least to loosen up. Country standards here thump okay on the faster ones but sure plod on the ballads. “Roll in My Sweet Baby’s Arms” charted, barely. “I’ll Sail My Ship Alone,” “The Battle of New Orleans.”

Earl Scruggs Dueling Banjos – Earl playing with his plugged-in boys, picking a kind of electric bluegrass. All mighty fine, but I do wish they’d rocked a few more numbers farther afield, like they do with “Lonesome Reuben” and “Stringbender.”   

Red Simpson Truckers Christmas – “Christmas Wheels,” “Out on the Road for Christmas.”

Connie Smith Dream Painter – Not even one of the genre’s greatest vocalists can overcome songs this unmemorable. Mildly memorable exceptions: Her old friend Bill Anderson’s “Tiny Blue Transistor Radio,” and is Martha Sharp’s “Born a Woman” feminist or merely fatalist?

Hank Snow Grand Ole Opry Favorites – My long-simmering take is that there are no bad Hank Snow albums. If you’re already a fan of Snow’s nasal croon and hot flatpicking, then go ahead move this collection of road and train songs to nearer the top of your pile. If you need convincing, try “I’m Not at All Sorry for You,” “Crack in the Box Car Door,” or “Bob.”

The Statler Brothers Carry Me Back – There’s a dreary strain of country songwriting, more prevalent this century than last, that looks back to one’s high school years as the highlight of a life. I blame the Statlers. Their suicide and divorce-including “The Class of ‘57” (from the year before) is complicated anti-nostalgia at its best, but this one’s “Whatever Happened to Randolph Scott?” just wants the world to get off its lawn. Watch Ride the High Country instead.

The Strangers Totally Instrumental with One Exception – Merle Haggard and his Strangers’ lead guitarist Roy Nichols chat a little before and during the country blues “Cotton Picker,” but the “one exception” is Merle singing a gently swinging bit of “I’m Sitting on Top of the World.” The final of the four instrumental Strangers albums, with Roy, pedal steel man Norman Hamlet and fiddler Johnny Gimble playing through and around some lovely melodies, and along with drummer Biff Adams, guitarist Bobby Wanye and bassist Dennis Hromek, this was one of the best bands planet Earth has ever heard. “Champaigne,” “Country Gas,” “Cherokee Fiddle,” “Somewhere Over the Rainbow.”

Nat Stuckey Take Time to Love Her / I Used It All on You – Stuckey sounds like a smoother Waylon, and #10 single “Take Time to Love Her” startles pleasantly thanks to a herky-jerky Jerry Foster melody and head-snapping Jerry Bradley production. The rest is a very good singer who most people have long forgotten, singing songs they maybe haven’t. “Baby Don’t Get Hooked on Me,” “Good Time Charlie’s Got the Blues,” “Crystal Chandeliers,” “Lovin’ on Backstreets.”

Hank Thompson Kindly Keep It Country – At this point in his long and highly valued career, ol’ Hank’s voice had deteriorated enough that he probably should’ve stayed away from modern ballads like “Behind Closed Doors” and “Four in the Morning.” Then again, countrypolitan ballad “The Corner of My Life” works pretty well. His age-appropriate “The Older the Violin, the Sweeter the Music” was his next-to-last Top Ten.

Conway Twitty She Needs Someone to Hold Her When She Cries – Not one of his best, but “She Needs Someone…” topped the charts, and “I’ve Just Destroyed the World” and “Each Season Changes You” are just as strong.  

Porter Wagoner The Farmer – One of Porter’s many concept albums, The Farmer seems like it should be a genre natural but feels a little more like a missed opportunity. “Wake Up, Jacob” (#37), “The County Farm,” “The Sun Don’t Shine (on the Same Dog Every Day).” Also, when he ran out of farming cuts: The funky “Country Bo-Bo,” a dance “kinda like the Penguin or the Robot, the Electric Twist or the One Leg Hop.”

Scott Walker Stretch — “A Woman Left Lonely”

Jim Weatherly A Gentler Time and Jim Weatherly – In 1974, Ray Price would release an album, You’re the Best Thing That Ever Happened to Me, that, with the notable exception of that famous Weatherly-written title track, was mostly comprised of songs taken from these two 1973 albums from the singer-songwriter. “It Must Be Love This Time,” “Jesus Is My Kind of People.”

Eric Weissberg, Steve Mandell and Marshall Brickman Dueling Banjos from the Original Soundtrack of Deliverance and Additional Music – The iconic banjo number was a #2 pop hit but could only manage #5 country.

Freddy Weller Too Much Monkey Business – The gone-country former member of Paul Revere & the Raiders scored his second Top Ten Chuck Berry hit with the title track. His own “The Perfect Stranger” namedropped Paul McCartney and went Top 20, his “Betty Anne and Shirley Cole” turns out to be a proto-“Goodbye Earl,” and “You Got What It Takes” is a countrified Joe Tex number.  

Dottie West If It’s All Right with You / Just What I’ve Been Looking For – Both of the unmemorable title tracks made the Top 20. “It Sure Seemed Right.”

Tony Joe White Homemade Ice Cream –Only barely enhanced guitar and voice demos of “For Old Time’s Sake,” “Lazy,” “Did Somebody Make a Fool Out of You.”

Porter Wagoner and Dolly Parton Love and Music “If Teardrops Were Pennies” (#3), “Laugh the Years Away,” “Come to Me.”

Hank Williams, Jr. and the Cheatin’ Hearts Just Pickin’… No Singin’ – Wasn’t expecting much from a Hank Jr. instrumental album, but this is a blast, with Jr.’s backing band trying on everything from Cajun and bluegrass (“Bocephus Banjo”) to country funk, Nashville Sound and more.

Tammy Wynette Kids Say the Darndest Things – This collection of previously released singles and album tracks climbed to #3 on the country albums chart.

Faron Young The Hurts on Me and Just What I Had in Mind – Faron Young chasing another chart topper after 1972’s “It’s Four in the Morning” had captured lonely in a bottle for him. These countrypolitan efforts are fussier than a singer this good needs or than the songs themselves deserve. “She Fights that Lovin’ Feeling” made it only to # 15, but “Just What I Had in Mind” did crack the Top Ten.

*****

For further study…

Many, but not all, of the entries on my “For Further Study” list point to how much old country, defined either widely or narrowly, that is still unavailable to stream—and, I’m afraid, will likely remain that way. Other titles here just point back to me, underscoring the limits of my record collection, my imagination, and… my time! Also, they point out my ignorance. I mean, just how much longer should this list be? Suggestions welcome.

Don Adams On His Way

Kenny Baker and Josh Graves Bucktime

Brook Benton Something for Everyone

Big Tom & the Mainliners The Image of Me — Irish country singer. Besides the Twitty title cut includes versions of songs by Hank, Merle, etc.

The Blackwood Brothers On Stage and A Father’s Prayer and The Blackwood Brothers, Featuring Cecil Blackwood and Hallelujah to the King – These four albums from the famed “Southern gospel” vocal group were all released on Skylite Records, the label the Brothers co-owned with the Statesmen Quartet. (See below)

Bobby “Blue” Bland His California Album

The Blue Ridge Quartet Puts It Together

Pat Boone Born Again and I Love You More Everyday

Clarence “Gatemouth” Brown Gates on the Heat (AKA The Drifter Rides Again)

Marti Brown Ms. Marti Brown – “Let My Love Shine” cracked the country 100.

Brush Arbor Brush Arbor and Brush Arbor 2 A California-based country-rocking and bluegrass gospel-harmony group. “Brush Arbor Meeting” and their go at CCR’s “Proud Mary” both peaked outside the country Top 40. Ditto, on 2, for their version of Gilbert O’Sullivan’s “Alone Again Naturally.”

Ace Cannon Baby Don’t Get Hooked on Me and Country Comfort

Henson Cargill This Is Henson Cargill Country

Maybelle Carter Mother Maybelle Carter — A double album.

Johnny Carver Tie a Yellow Ribbon Around the Old Oak Tree – The Tony Orlando cover title track and “You Really Haven’t Changed” were #5 and #6 country hits, respectively. Primo examples of non-canonical country.

Johnny Cash The Gospel Road – I have this double album but, sorry Johnny, didn’t have the time.

Cher Half Breed

Roy Clark Come Live with Me and Family Album – On the first of these 1973 Clark sets, the title track was a country chart topper, “Somewhere Between Love and Tomorrow” hit #2, and both singles cracked the Hot 100.

Lee Clayton Lee Clayton

Commander Cody and His Lost Planet Airmen Country Cassanova

Wilma Lee & Stoney Cooper The Great Speckled Bird

The Country Gentlemen The Country Gentlemen

Jim Croce I Got a Name – “I’ll Have to Say I Love You in a Song” was a minor country hit, a #1 Easy Listening, a Top Ten pop hit.

Dick Curless Live at the Wheeling Truck Drivers Jamboree and The Last Blues Song

Charley Daniels Honey in the Rock

Danny Davis and the Nashville Brass Travelin’ and Caribbean Cruise

Jimmie Davis God’s Last Altar Call

Lenny Dee By Popular Dee-Mand

Delbert and Glen Subject to Change – McClinton and Clark.

Neil Diamond Rainbow

The Dillards Tribute to the American Duck

Roy Druskey Doin’ Something Right – Includes four charting country singles, two of them Top 40.

Tony Douglas Thank You for Touching My Life – The title track and “My Last Day” were both Top 40 country singles. Includes a version of Merle’s “Today I Started Loving You Again.”

Dave Dudley Keep on Truckin’

Bob Dylan Dylan

Phil Everly Star-Spangled Springer

Barbara Fairchild Kid Stuff – Comes with a pair of non-canonical Top Tens, “Kid Stuff” and “Baby Doll.”

Donna Fargo My Second Album and All about a Feeling – Singer-songwriter landed two more #1’s here, “You Were Always There” and the super “Superman.”

Dick Feller Dick Feller Wrote

Lefty Frizzell The Legendary Lefty Frizzell – Inexplicably, “I Never Go Around Mirrors” was only a #25 hit.

Narvel Felts Drift Away and When Your Love Was Mine – Felts’ non-canonical cover of Dobie Gray’s “Drift Away” was Top Ten country.

Lester Flatt Live Bluegrass Festival – With guest Bill Monroe.

The Florida Boys Better than Ever and Up in the Sky with the Florida Boys and What a Difference Jesus Makes – Long time gospel vocal group, favorites of Elvis. “For Further Study” could probably double in length merely by adding all the releases in what retroactively became known as Southern gospel.

Tennessee Ernie Ford Jesus Loves Me and Country Morning and Ernie Ford Sings about Jesus

Don Gibson Touch the Morning – “Touch…” was a #6 hit.

Tompall Glaser Charlie

Dobie Gray Loving Arms

Ray Griff Songs for Everyone and The Middle of the Road

George Hamilton IV Out West Country and International Ambassador of Country Music

Linda Hargrove Music Is Your Mistress

Freddie Hart Super Kind of Woman and Trip to Heaven and If You Can’t Feel It (It Ain’t There) – Hart’s popularity in the early 1970s tends to be forgotten. Super Kind… was Hart’s second #1 country album of the year, the follow-up to his 1972-released Got the All Overs for You, and the other two albums above were both country Top Tens.

Z. Z. Hill The Best Thing that’s Happened to Me

Adolph Hofner Your Friend Adolph Hofner – Only been able to track down about half of this one, but what I’ve heard—“Jalisco” (a Tex-Mex number sung by Hofner’s daughter Kathy), plus “Kansas City,” “Steel Guitar Rag,” and “Mansion on the Hill”—make me want to track down the rest.

David Houston Good Things

Frank Ifield Someone to Give My Love To

The Imperials The Imperials Live… with Solid Rock

Sonny James Greatest Country Hits of 1972 – A covers collection of recent country chart hits that went to #12 on the album chart.

Dave Kirby Singer Picker Writer

Brenda Lee Brenda – “Nobody Wins,” a Kristofferson song, went #5 country and #70 pop.

The Lewis Family The Lewis Family Lives in a Happy World and Country Sunday in Georgia

Lobo Calumet

Charlie Louvin Louvin Loves ‘Em

Judy Lynn Naturally

Warner Mack Great Country

Manassas Down the Road

Jimmy Martin Moonshine Hollow

O B. McClinton Live at Randy’s Rodeo – Bookended by versions of “Don’t Let the Green Grass Fool You,” this live set also includes Elvis and Merle covers, plus a five-song Charley Pride medley.

Country Joe McDonald Paris Sessions

Bill Monroe Father and Son – With his boy James.

Melba Montgomery Melba Montgomery – Her first Elektra album.

Charlie Moore and the Dixie Partners – A Tribute to Clyde Moody

The New Grass Revival The New Grass Revival

Mickey Newbury Heaven Help the Child and Live at Montezuma Hall

Marie Osmond Paper Roses – That monster crossover hit, plus covers of songs associated with Brenda Lee, Patsy Cline, Ray Stevens and Wynn Stewart. Produced by Sonny James.

Tommy Overstreet My Friends Call Me T. O. – “Send Me No Roses” and “I’ll Never Break These Chains” were each a non-canonical Top Ten.

Buck Owens and Susan Raye The Good Old Days – “The Good Old Days (Are Here Again)” (#35)

Carl Perkins My Kind of Country

Kenny Price California Women

Susan Raye Cheating Games and Plastic Planes, Paper Trains and Hymns by Susan Raye

Del Reeves Truckers Paradise

Bobby G. Rice You Lay So Easy on My Mind – More big non-canonical country hits. Title song was #3, “You Give Me You” was Top Ten.  

Jeannie C. Riley When Love Has Gone Away and Just Jeannie

Johnny Rivers Blue Suede Shoes

Kenny Rogers with the First Edition Monumental and Rollin’

Johnny Russell Rednecks, White Socks and Blue Ribbon Beer – The iconic title track (#4) and “The Baptism of Jesse Taylor” (#14).

Troy Seals Now Presenting Troy Seals

Jeanne Seely Can I Sleep in Your Arms – A #6 title track.

Jean Shepard Slippin’ Away – A #4 title track.

Arthur Smith and Bobby Thompson Battling Banjos

Cal Smith Cal Smith

Connie Smith Love Is the Look You’re Looking For – Title track was a #8 hit.

Jerry Smith The New Sound – Piano man who’d had four charting country sides, in 1969 to ‘70.

Red Sovine The Greatest Grand Ole Opry

The Statesmen Quartet A Time to Remember: Big Chief Wetherington with the Statesmen Quartet and The Statesmen Quartet Featuring Doyle Ott (Both on Starlite Records)

Red Steagall Somewhere My Love and If You’ve Got the Time, I’ve Got the Song

Ray Stevens Losin’ Streak

B. W. Stevenson My Maria – In 23 years Brooks & Dunn topped the country charts with the same song and, tellingly, what amounted to the same arrangement.

Mel Street The Town Where You Live

Jud Strunk Daisy a Day – Multi-format smash “Daisy a Day” went #33 country,  #4 easy listening, and #14 pop.

Mel Tillis and Sherry Bryce Let’s Go All the Way Tonight

Toni and Terry Cross-Country – A country spin-off of Joy of Cooking.

Diana Trask It’s a Man’s World

Ernest Tubb I’ve Got All the Heartaches I Can Handle

Various Artists Original Soundtrack Recording of Catch My Soul – Loose musical adaptation of Othello, with Tony Joe White, Richie Havens, Delaney and Bonnie. 

Kenny Vernon Loverville

Billy Walker The Hand of Love

Jerry Wallace. Do You Know What It’s Like to Be Lonesome and Primrose Lane / Don’t Give Up on Me “Do You Know…” was a #2 hit, “Don’t Give Up…” a #3: non-canonical. “Primrose…” was a new version of Wallace’s Top Ten signature, from 1959.

Doc and Merle Watson Then and Now

Hank Williams, Jr. The Legend of Hank Williams in Song and Story – Hank, Sr. collection with Jr. narrating between tracks, I think…

…..

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