Hello all you fans of Ray Stevens! Some of the most recent video uploads on social media centering around Ray are his performances on Larry's Country Diner. This country music television show had a decades long run on RFD-TV and it went out of production recently. Repeat episodes have continued to air and a lot of the content is on YouTube. Earlier this month, September 7th to be exact, a short playlist of Ray Stevens appearances on Larry's TV show debuted on YouTube. The playlist contains 4 performances from various points in time. The videos feature not only Ray's music performances but also his banter with the host and his jokes hurled at the audience. The playlist is comprised of the following songs: "Mississippi Squirrel Revival", "The Gambler and the Octopus", "The Preacher and the Bear", and "Since Bubba Changed His Name to Charlene".
Now, in addition to that video playlist, there have also been several video uploads from Ray's guest appearances on Larry's TV show. The video of his performance of "If Jesus is a Stranger" was uploaded a week ago. Ray recorded that song for his 2014 gospel album, Gospel Collection. The 2014 album received a follow-up a couple of years later titled Just a Closer Walk With Thee.
Here is Ray's performance of "If Jesus is a Stranger"...
If you want to examine the numbers (unique views) of the various Ray Stevens video performance uploads from Larry's Country Diner here is a list of the most recent unique views for numerous video clips from the show. These numbers are in rounded figures, not in exact numerical data. For example, a video that's gotten over 9,100 unique views will be shown on the list as 9.1K. Now, keep in mind that the numbers will change over the course of time. The year following each video upload is when they debuted on YouTube. There are a few songs on this list that were performed by Ray on more than one episode and those performances are on YouTube as well but I decided to highlight performances by him at random. "If Jesus is a Stranger", for example, was performed by Ray one two different episodes, years apart from the other, but I singled just one of those performances out and reported the unique view data. In case you're wondering the letter, K, stands for thousand. So, 22K would mean that the particular video upload has gotten more than 22,000 unique views but less than 22,100 which would be written as 22.1K
I have highlighted in bold print the video uploads that have gotten more than 100,000 unique views. If you're reading this blog entry 10 days, 10 weeks, or 10 months from now these numbers will be higher as time goes by but as of September 29, 2024 here are the numbers on YouTube for 10 Ray Stevens performances on Larry's Country Diner:
1. If Jesus is a Stranger; 2024 upload 9.1K unique views
2. Ray Stevens Playlist; 2024 (as seen above; 4 performances) 4.1K unique views
3. Amazing Grace; 2024 6.6K unique views
4. Dry Bones; 2024 upload 22K unique views
5. Bubba Changed His Name to Charlene; 2024 500K unique views
6. The Gambler and the Octopus; 2023 400K unique views
7. Ray Stevens Episode (Season 22); 2023 196K unique views
8. Ray Stevens Episode (Season 19); 2024 7.6K unique views
9. You're the Cupholder of My Life; 2023 1.9K unique views
10. Where Are All The 12 Year Old's?; 2023 4.6K unique views
Hello once again! Ever since I began this fan created blog centered around legendary Ray Stevens one of the albums that I've often spotlighted and singled out is a release simply titled The Best of Ray Stevens. Now, if you're a dedicated fan of his, then you'll know that The Best of Ray Stevens or a variation of that title is the title of many compilation albums that have been released on Ray over the decades. Some may wonder how does a fan keep it all straight given the similar titles of compilation albums and some may have trouble keeping track. One of the things I've always done is relay the year of release or the record company name. For example The Best of Ray Stevens released by Mercury Records in 1970 could be referred to as The Best of Ray Stevens (Mercury) or The Best of Ray Stevens (1970).
I love the album cover. I like the design and I like the photo of Ray that's used. I also like the coloring. Now, eagle eye fans of Ray or those that already are aware, will notice that in the lower left hand side there's a K-Tel mark. That's the record company that issued this particular The Best of Ray Stevens in 1980. As mentioned earlier there can be a lot of confusion for those that are new to Ray's career and are browsing through his album discography given there are several compilation albums using the same title. For this particular album it might be best to explain that it had been released a year earlier by a company called Imperial House. That particular release happened to be a 2-LP set but as you can see it contains the same title, lettering, coloring, and photo that the 1980 K-Tel release has. The 1979 release has the phrase, 2 Record Set, on display just below Ray's name with the Imperial House mark on the lower left hand side of the album cover. The image shown first is the 1979 Imperial House 2-LP release. The 1980 release wasn't a 2-LP collection but it did feature 18 of the 20 recordings found on the 1979 release. The 1979 2-LP set features 20 recordings ranging from the 1960s through his then most recent recording, "I Need Your Help, Barry Manilow". However, do not let the inclusion of that 1979 recording fool you. It's the only Warner Brothers recording by Ray to make the album's track list. The label skipped over the recordings he did in 1976, 1977, and 1978. Here is the track list of that 1979 double album. LP One, Side 1: "Ahab the Arab", "Indian Love Call", "Harry the Hairy Ape", "Unwind", and "Gitarzan". LP One, Side 2: "Mr. Businessman", "Along Came Jones", "Freddie Feelgood", "Nashville", and "Turn Your Radio On". LP Two, Side One: "Everything is Beautiful", "America, Communicate With Me", "Sunday Mornin' Comin' Down", "The Moonlight Special", and "The Streak". LP Two, Side 2: "Misty", "Have a Little Talk With Myself", "Isn't It Lonely Together?", "Bridget the Midget", and "I Need Your Help, Barry Manilow". The two recordings left off of the 1980 K-Tel release were "Unwind" and "I Need Your Help, Barry Manilow".
A budget minded person may ask oneself: why did the 1979 release with 20 recordings contain 2 vinyl albums yet the 1980 release with 18 recordings contain just 1 vinyl album? I wish I knew the answer. Perhaps the company that issued the 1979 release wanted the allure of having the advertisement of "a 2-LP collection!!" to accompany the sales campaign. It's a collection I wish I had. By the way, did I say that the album photo is one of my all-time favorites of Ray Stevens? I think I did...yeah, I did...
Well, well, well.. here I am once again and I'm finally posting my review of the most recent Ray Stevens recording, "Boom-Boom Gentlemen's Club". I wrote the review back on September 13th, the day the song became available for order/download. It was not published on the internet until nearly a week later. If I recall correctly the review was published on September 19th but when you visit Amazon's product page for the digital single you'll see September 13th as the publish date since it's that date I submitted the review.
As I had assumed back on the 13th this photo of Ray is indeed the publicity photo being used on the various online/streaming music sites to promote the newest release. This is the review I posted over on Amazon. As a long time fan of Ray Stevens I eagerly anticipate each new release from him. I've been a fan for decades... going back to the mid to late 1980s. The eye catching title of his recent recording, "The Boom-Boom Gentlemen's Club", had me curious to how the overall song would sound. I was thinking to myself how that title would be worked into a song and sure enough Ray found a way! The song, written by Ray and another writer, Nick Sibley, is a very lively story of a woman named Ida and her double life at a gentlemen's club in Tulsa where she goes by the name of Tassie. There's some irony and a twist ending, of sorts, so it's best to pay close attention as the mile a minute lyrics come at you. As said it's a lively song but it's also very up-tempo. I listened to it 3 times before I was able to take in all of the activity taking place within the lyrics of the song. It's a very entertaining comedy song and the energetic harmonica lends itself to the sound that Ray was apparently going for. This comedy song, as far as I know, is going to be one of the songs on an as yet to be released Ray Stevens album. I don't know if the album will be issued by the end of 2024 or not.
When you listen to the song yourselves you're going to love it as much as I did. The twist ending, which I intentionally kept vague in my review on the 13th, has to do with Dakota telling Ida that she looks like a woman at the gentlemen's club. Ida's reaction upon hearing this gives her the courage, perhaps, to give him a piece of her mind, angry at him for being there in the first place. You can listen to the song by way of this YouTube embed.
Well, hello all of you fans of Ray Stevens!!! This is official single release day of Ray's new single, "The Boom-Boom Gentlemen's Club". Have you heard it yet? The audio track is on all of the usual places on social media where you can listen to music. I listen to audio tracks on YouTube or Spotify depending on which site I have open on any given day. I purchased the single over on Amazon earlier today and wrote a small review. I don't know when the review will be posted on their site. Once it becomes posted over there I'll copy and paste it in a future blog entry and add more information as well. At the moment I don't know who the musicians are. I'm making the assumption that the keyboard player is Ray. The harmonica is the dominant instrument and a few of us fans of Ray were wondering if it was being played by Charlie McCoy. I know that Ray uses a synthesizer a lot but I don't think this is a harmonica coming from any kind of synthesizer. I asked about the musician credits, particularly the harmonic player, in a social media post today. I hope to have an answer at some point today. The song is about a woman named Ida and a guy named Dakota. She leads a double life in that she goes by an alias, Hassie, in a gentlemen's club in Tulsa. Dakota, meanwhile, frequents this place and unbeknownst to him he doesn't know who Hassie really is given the make-up and clothing she wears when she's doing the kind of work she does. It's a cute, fun song... and I've listened to it 4 times since it become available. It's an up-tempo song and Ray sings it fast, too, so you're bound to need to hear it multiple times to catch everything he's singing about. There's a lot of activity going on. You can hear the song when you click this LINK. Once you open the link you can choose which music service you're familiar with. If you read this blog entry weeks or months from now and the link doesn't work simply search for Ray's name and the song title on YouTube or Spotify.
Hello fans of Ray Stevens!! It's me once again...and this time around the blog entry is focusing on an upcoming new song set to be released on September 13th. So we're 12 days and counting to the new single. What is it's title?? Well, it has the eye-catching title of "The Boom Boom Gentlemen's Club". Ray posted a teaser of an upload on his social media sites but it only features a few seconds of the music intro. Initially I thought it may be an instrumental and I asked those in the know if there will be lyrics or if it's an instrumental. I got a reply stating that it contains lyrics but they were only providing a teaser, intro music only, to generate awareness that a new comedy song from Ray is soon to be released. I was given the name of an upcoming comedy album but I won't make mention of it as to not get in the way of their marketing/publicity strategy in the days leading up to and after the song's release online.
As far as I know there won't be a music video of "The Boom Boom Gentlemen's Club" but maybe there's one in the works, that's just me guessing; and, I'm also under the impression that this upcoming comedy album, whenever it gets released, will feature the official recordings of songs Ray has performed on stage at the CabaRay and on select media appearances the last couple of years: "You're the Cupholder of My Life", "Where Are All The 12 Year Old's That Use to Mow My Lawn?", "The More You Cry", and the audio track of "Since Bubba Changed His Name to Charlene". The first two songs mentioned were performed on an episode of Larry's Country Diner as was the last song mentioned. Ray had also performed "Where Are All The 12 Year Old's?" on an episode of the Huckabee television show. "The More You Cry" has only been performed in concerts at the CabaRay.
When promoting the upcoming single release of "The Boom Boom Gentlemen's Club" Ray used the photo showing him looking inside the top of a microphone as seen above. I don't know if that's the photo that'll accompany the single release on September 13 when it begins appearing on numerous online music sites.
Well, hello out there!!! No, you're not reading any kind of typo or anything.. it's my first fan created Ray Stevens blog post since April 29th of this year. Why such a long hiatus you may be asking yourselves? It was my own self-imposed hiatus from blog writing. I remained active on Ray's social media pages in the meantime leaving commentary and interacting with other people leaving comments on Ray's social media pages, mainly Facebook. If you follow Ray's social media you know that he's kept those pages active, too, with a post or two per day and lots of video attachments. He's continued to perform concerts at his CabaRay showroom and as most of you may know this is his final season of concerts. He broke the news back in January before this upcoming concert season began.
In this blog post I'm sharing a recent video upload from Ray's YouTube channel. On August 26, 2024 a concert performance of Ray delivering "The Streak" from 1986 made it's debut on social media. If you're a fan of Ray Stevens you're going to love it and if you happen to be a student of Ray Stevens, meaning that you know a lot about his life and career in addition to being a major fan, you're going to know that this 1986 performance comes during his first stint with MCA Records. He was right in the middle of that lengthy series of comedy albums and riding a wave of discovery, or re-discovery, depending on the knowledge of the individual music listener. The performance took place in July 1986 which means it happened a month after Ray won his first Music City News Comedian of the Year award. Ray would win this high profile, fan-voted award every year for 9 consecutive years (1986, 1987, 1988, 1989, 1990, 1991, 1992, 1993, and 1994).
In this 1986 performance you'll see Ray decked out in sunglasses, dark green clothes, and at various moments wearing a yellow CAT hat. The thumbnail image of the video shows this but just in case you view this blog post in the future and the image is gone due to some sort of glitch I thought I'd let you all know what he appears in ahead of viewing. I love the green clothing. The temperature in St. Clairsville, Ohio must have been in the 80s or low 90s that day. When the performance of "The Streak" is over you'll see Ray jog off-stage carrying a suit. He must have began his set wearing the jacket but then, as he literally got hotter, removed it. The song originally hit in 1974.. there have long been rumors that actual streakers could be seen at his concerts but I've always doubted that kind of thing happening. It's possible that streaking took place near a concert venue, fair, or festival he was performing at or somewhere in the vicinity if it happened to be what they call a college town but within the audience of a concert I don't think such things happened but it's fun to say it did. Boogity Boogity... here's Ray Stevens and "The Streak"...
Hello fans of Ray Stevens!! If you happen to be in my age group (40s) then one of the songs that you may be familiar with from Ray is "Sex Symbols". In the era of the internet you really don't have to have been born prior to the song's release to know about it. All you have to be is a Ray Stevens fan with access to online video/music and "Sex Symbols" will be among the song/video selections available to enjoy. Given that today is the birthday of Willie Nelson (turning 91) I thought it would be fun to spotlight Ray's recording of "Sex Symbols" today. Why? Well, the song features Ray doing a vocal impression of Latin singer Julio Iglesias. Willie and Julio teamed up in 1984 to record a duet together called "To All The Girls I've Loved Before". It became a million selling international hit. It spawned some parodies given the unlikely pairing of Willie and Julio. In 1987 Ray released a comedy album titled Crackin' Up. Although the main single release from that album happened to be "Would Jesus Wear a Rolex?" Ray eventually issued "Sex Symbols" as a single. It's B-side being "The Ballad of Cactus Pete and Lefty". In "Sex Symbols" Ray sings as himself as well as Julio. Ray, performing in an exaggerated southern accent, continually pronounces the 'J' in Julio's name (coming out as jew-lee-o) and mispronounces a lot of other names along the way for comic effect. Ray and Julio sing about how popular they are with women. In the chorus of the song Ray gives his examples of who he feels are extremely popular "Sex Symbols". Julio, on the other hand, gives examples of sex symbols from classic movies.
When Ray performed the song in concert he utilized a dummy of Julio (seen above). Ray would sing to a click track in concert. As Ray operated the dummy's mouth, and kept the dummy upright next to him, the audio track of Ray as Julio would be playing. "Sex Symbols" became a very popular song in his concerts during the latter half of the 1980s. When Ray was performing at his former theater in Branson, Missouri (1991-1993) "Sex Symbols" is a song he chose to perform during a 1992 concert (the footage surfaced in 1993 on a VHS home video titled Ray Stevens Live!). I don't know if the song was still in his setlist by 1992 or if he decided to include a performance of it because he knew that 1992 show was going to be offered at a later date on VHS home video and with it containing "Sex Symbols", one of his popular songs in concert in that time period, it could generate more publicity with it's inclusion. That's just my theory. This 1992 performance by Ray visually captures how "Sex Symbols" was performed in front of audiences. This performance coming from his Branson theater and filmed with his own cameras and other equipment gives it a different visual and audio quality than what you may have seen if watching the performance on TV in the late 1980s.
Hello fans of Ray Stevens! Earlier today, given that it's the birthday of Bobby Bare, Ray uploaded his own performance of "Detroit City". This particular song, from the pen of Mel Tillis and Danny Dill, had been recorded by Billy Grammer less than a year before Bobby's recording was released. In fact, the song was titled "I Wanna Go Home" when released by Billy Grammer. The song became a Top-20 country hit and peaked early in 1963. Bobby recorded the song in the spring of 1963 as "Detroit City" and by the end of the summer it hit the Top-10 on the country chart and crossed over to the Pop and Adult-Contemporary formats. The single crossed over internationally and reportedly hit number one in Sweden, Norway, and the Top-10 in Denmark. Bobby's recording was released on RCA and was produced by Chet Atkins. A few years later, in 1966, Ray did the arrangement for Bobby's recording of "Streets of Baltimore". If you have the vinyl album of Streets of Baltimore you'll see Ray credited with the arrangement of that recording. The liner notes for the album were written by Eddy Arnold. Chet Atkins was the producer.
Ray speaks, briefly, about the recording session for the song. Something that one has to remember is that Ray witnessed a lot of recording sessions in his career. Now, of course, he played on a lot of recording sessions but what some may not realize is that Ray often was in recording studios during sessions and rehearsals that he, personally, didn't participate in but witnessed. He was often showing up at the recording studios of Mercury, Monument, Columbia, and RCA given his jack-of-all-trades skill set or he simply shown up due to his friendships with producers such as Shelby Singleton, Fred Foster, Chet Atkins, and Jerry Kennedy.
Hello Ray Stevens fans!! I'm a week late in promoting the April concerts at the CabaRay. I've been busy offline and have only been able to be online for a few visits each day to some social media sites and to check my e-mail. The April concerts began last week. Ray will be in concert at his CabaRay showroom six additional times this month. He'll be doing two concerts per week: April 11th, 13th, 18th, 20th, 25th, and 27th. As most of you know this is Ray's final season of concerts at his showroom and if you haven't visited the CabaRay and experienced what I call Ray Stevens World then you should make plans to attend a concert this year. You can find out all about the showroom and everything else when you click this LINK.
We're at the half year point with Ray's comedy song/music video, "Since Bubba Changed His Name to Charlene". Ray uploaded the music video to his YouTube and Facebook pages whereas Curb Records uploaded the audio track to various streaming music platforms. The publicity photo doesn't accompany the single since there actually isn't a physical CD single. The song is available as a digital download and can be viewed as a music video, too. The photo is simply used for publicity and as a reaction to the song's title. The video debuted on YouTube on October 5, 2023. The unique views that it's received in the last 6 months puts it at 606,793. The song is very funny and it's delivered in Ray's characteristic lighthearted fashion. As is the case with other Ray Stevens recordings that tackle something topical and in the news he delivers the performance from a common man's perspective. The lyrics in the topical comedy songs that he's recorded, off and on, since 2009 are rarely heavy handed. The idea behind delivering a soft touch is to basically get your point across without pounding somebody over the head about it. I don't know if Ray has performed this song in concert...one would think that he would...so if anybody out there has went to a Ray Stevens concert at the CabaRay recently or plans to go let us know if he performs "Since Bubba Changed His Name to Charlene".
Hello fans of Ray Stevens!!! As we wind down women's history month and as we wind down the examination of love songs and comedy songs that Ray has sung that fit the theme of this limited blog series during women's history month we begin with 1981 and the release of the fabulous album titled One More Last Chance. This album is chock full of love songs...everything from full-on passionate pleas of longing to heartache and heartbreak. It's a ballad heavy album and the title track features a neat combination of steel guitar and electric guitar trading solo's within the song. It starts out with an electric guitar but eventually you'll hear the steel guitar. "One More Last Chance" is a song about a broken relationship and how the guy realizes his mistakes/faults and begs forgiveness. The woman has apparently taken him back time and time again and given him one last chance each time but now, as he says, he wants her to give him just "One More Last Chance". The album's title track was the second single release from the album. The first single had actually hit several months before the album was released. Late in 1980 "Night Games" emerged. The bouncy song is like a page right out of any night club all over the country. In 1980, when the topic of bar rooms was brought up, what would immediately come to mind is the movie, Urban Cowboy, and the bar/nightclub featured in the movie was called Gilley's. The bar was a business venture between country singer Mickey Gilley and a businessman named Sherwood Cryer. It was located in Pasadena, Texas and was in operation from 1970 until it literally burned to the ground in 1990. The album cover shows Ray in the clothing that most, if not all, country music and aspiring country music singers as well as fans were wearing in the aftermath of the 1980 movie. The bar and movie popularized the mechanical bull, too.
"Night Games", as mentioned, fits into that era as we hear about a single's bar where we're told the story of two strangers hoping to find romance. The thing that happens, however, is the two have a one night stand and they wake up to find they're not compatible and feel just as strange to one another as the moment they met the night before. Elsewhere on the album is his up-tempo rendition of "Pretend" plus we have a big ballad titled "Certain Songs". Heartbreak is the subject in the ballad "Just About Love". A tale of a couple with opposite personalities and backgrounds is told in "Melissa". We're not told why the woman is no longer in the relationship, however, but from Ray's singing we're informed that he's missing her. In a ballad-heavy album "Pretend" is the only song that's really super charged up-tempo. "Night Games" is a bouncy sing-a-long whereas "Let's Do It Right This Time" and "One More Last Chance" are a combination between ballad and mid-tempo.
In 1982, from the Don't Laugh Now album, Ray returns to a more balanced approach of up-tempo and ballad recordings. The album kicks off with the rocking "Such a Night". The retro feel of the music arrangement might be the reason the album's title is written in a '50s neon design.
The album, produced by Ray Stevens and Bob Montgomery, is fun to listen to as are so many of Ray's albums. "Such a Night", "Take That Girl Away", "Oh, Leo Lady", and practically the entire album is devoted to love songs as well. The two songs that were issued as single releases were "Written Down in My Heart", a ballad, and the gospel-flavored "Where The Sun Don't Shine". The cleverest song, "Oh, Leo Lady", takes the sound of yodeling as in oh-lee-oh-lady-hoo but transform it into a love song using astrology. In the song Ray sings about being in love with a Leo in spite of his horoscope saying that a Leo isn't part of his destiny. It's the only song, that I'm aware of, that uses astrology as a backdrop and incorporates Leo, Gemini, Pisces, Jupiter, Scorpio, etc. into the lyrics. The album's title track is a slow ballad that visits the theme of unrequited love. In the song Ray sings about a guy that's in love with a woman and he tells her how much he loves her and for how long he's had feelings for her. He asks that she "Don't Laugh Now" given how she's always seen him as a friend and nothing more. "Country Boy, Country Club Girl" is a song about two people from different backgrounds finding one another. He's a country kid who worked as a lifeguard inside a ritzy country club. He falls for a woman named Mary Lou Pickett. Her father happened to own a mill in town and he raised his family in an eight column house.
In 1983 Ray left the RCA label (signed with them in the latter half of 1979) and signed what turned out to be a one album deal with Mercury Records. He'd been on that label in his past. He recorded for them from 1961 until 1965. The results of the newest partnership began showing up in the latter half of 1983. A series of single releases emerged as well as the album, Me.
In hindsight there wasn't a lot of publicity surrounding the album. The album contains 10 songs and it features a combination of up-tempo, mid-tempo, and ballads. In recent years through social media several songs from the album have been discovered by fans...one, in particular, is the fun "Piece of Paradise Called Tennessee". The song should have been used for Nashville tourism or Tennessee Tourism but it never was. The single releases happened to be "Love Will Beat Your Brains Out", "Mary Lou Nights", and "My Dad". The latter, written by Dale Gonyea, is a salute to fathers. Although it has the eye catching title of "Love Will Beat Your Brains Out" it's a serious recording about mental stress and the anguish that being in love, or losing love, will bring. "Game Show Love" is my all-time favorite from the album. Through the incorporation of game show titles and catch-phrases we hear a song about how a woman was never serious about a relationship and all she did was string him along. The opening line in the song's chorus: 'love, is just a game to you...'. In "Yolanda" we hear a song about a guy's desire for a Spanish woman and in spite of his not being able to speak the language he nevertheless can't get her off of his mind. Have you ever heard a song about an anniversary of a break-up? In "Special Anniversary", a phrase we don't hear until the end of the song, Ray sings about seeing a woman that he used to love and wonders if his running into her is just a coincidence given that it had been exactly one year since the two broke up. It was a fantastic album and much, if not all, of the brief publicity for the album and it's songs arrived in the first couple of months in 1984. However, the Me album was ultimately overlooked and overshadowed by some big changes that took place in Ray's career in 1984. Seen below is Ray performing "My Dad" from an episode of his CabaRay Nashville television series.
Ray left Mercury Records and signed with MCA Records. Although the entire terms of the recording contract will never be public it was reported in country music media that he was signed as a comedy act. It was the first time in his career where he shifted his full attention to comedy and the first time he fully embraced being marketed as a comedy performer. His first five albums for the label were all comedy and the first four were huge record sellers. The 1984 debut, He Thinks He's Ray Stevens, contained what became an immediate classic... "It's Me Again, Margaret". This comedy song, in case you hadn't heard it, is about a prank caller named Willard McBain who calls up his victim, Margaret. In a series of phone calls he embarrasses the woman until she finally gets the police involved. They eavesdrop and hear Willard's latest verbal assault and he's arrested. There were some other songs on that album dealing with women. "Happy Hour is the Saddest Time of the Day" is a nutty comedy song about a pair of alcoholics. She's sobered up and left him which is why Happy Hour is a sad time for him. "I'm Kissin' You Goodbye" is the album's opening track. This is a very funny song, if you listen to it carefully, but it's performed seriously with an up-tempo bluegrass flavored arrangement.
This concludes my look at love songs (both non-comical and comical) from Ray Stevens. Now, don't let this overview lead you to think he's not recorded much more than what I've covered in this 5-part series. He's recorded more since 1984. In 1985, for example, there was "Punk Country Love" and then there was "Can He Love You Half as Much as I?" in 1986. In 1987 there was "The Flies of Texas", which in spite of it's title, is a love song about a guy who thinks he's marrying into money only to learn that his potential father-in-law owns a fleet of garbage trucks. "The Three Legged Man" tells the wild story of a guy who steals a woman away from another man. The other man happens to have a wooden leg and he steals it, too. So, now, he's a guy with three legs with a woman who has two legs and they're being chased by a one legged man.
Hello fans of Ray Stevens!! We only have 11 more days left in the month of March and so in this installment of love songs from Ray Stevens we pick up in the year 1977. Ray was no stranger to love ballads but during his years at Warner Brothers (1976-1979) and RCA (1980-1982) there were a whole lot more love ballads per album than at any other time. Well, that's not an official stat but it certainly seems like Ray was singing more love songs than ever.
Here we have the great Ray Stevens, in performance, in 1977 belting out one of those love songs. Completely lost in the song as anyone can see from looking at the photo. The album released that particular year was almost completely written by Ray. There were 10 songs on the album and Ray wrote 9 of them. Feel the Music, the name of the album, also features an unusual album photo. On the front of the album there's an illustration of a stereo speaker. On the back of the album there's an illustration of the back of a stereo speaker. The idea behind the album's cover art ties into the title track, "Feel the Music", literally. I come across a music critic's review of the 1977 album a couple of years ago while browsing online. The critic described Ray's style as bluesy-country. "Feel the Music", production wise, is marvelous as practically every Ray Stevens production is. The song has a catchy melody and at various moments Ray sounds as if he's totally in the spirit as the production takes on a gospel vibe. It's an inspirational song. Some of the love ballads on the 1977 album happen to be the exquisite "Road Widow", a song about a traveling musician constantly on the road but constantly thinking of the wife waiting at home. I'd never heard the expression, road widow, before but it's a neat song title for this kind of lonely, road weary song. How many of you are familiar with the phrase 'cheery sad song'? There shouldn't be hardly anyone familiar with the phrase since I just made it up. The phrase describes a sad love song with an up-tempo sing-a-long arrangement. A great example of this happens to be "Alone With You". When you see the title of the song while reading the track list on the album you'd think a song with a title like that would be a full-on, heavy romantic ballad. Well, it isn't.
"Alone With You" is a sad song about a couple who have lost the spark they once had and that the love is all gone and he sings "I'm all alone with you". The music arrangement is up-tempo and bouncy, as mentioned. Now, staying in the same vein, we have the mid-tempo bluesy "Blues Love Affair". That particular song is about a guy who's more or less unlucky in love and all his relationships cause him to be down in the dumps.. causing him to feel as if his love life is just a love affair with misery and the blues. The bluesy-country flavor continues with "Junkie for You", where Ray uses a man's intense desires for a woman as something comparable to an addict. It's a song that only Ray could've come up with.
Ray issued two albums in 1978. The first release was his salute/tribute to the music of the 1950s and 1960s. It was specifically rhythm and blues songs that crossed over to the pop chart. The album title, There is Something On Your Mind, is named for the album's closing number. It's a classic that's narrated frenetically. Ray provides commentary on both the front and the back of the album cover. He explains his reasons for recording the album. Then, on the back of the album, commentary from Ray appears underneath each track explaining his decision for recording it and giving some history behind each song. Every track on the album is a love song. It includes his renditions of "One Mint Julep", "Money Honey", plus several medley performances "Dance Trilogy", "Old Faithful Trilogy", and "Banned in Boston Trilogy". The latter features abbreviated performances of "Sixty Minute Man"/ "Work With Me, Annie"/ "Annie Had a Baby". The second album of 1978 was the more conventional album. Titled Be Your Own Best Friend it centers around love ballads, for the most part, and most of the love songs are performed in a soft-rock/Easy-Listening flavor. The one that features this touch the most is the inspirational "With a Smile".
The love songs found on the album are "You're Magic" (one of my all-time favorites), a soft re-recording of "You've Got the Music Inside", and the majestic "L'amour". That recording is another of my all-time favorites. It also has a neat backstory. Ray mentioned in an interview in the early 1990s that while he was on tour overseas he had heard one of the most beautiful melodies but couldn't understand the lyrics because the singer was French. Ray eventually found out the French recording artist's name and the title of the song. The singer/writer was Gilbert Becaud. Ray got permission to use the melody and he wrote English lyrics to it. "L'amour" is fabulous.. the music and Ray's singing.. it's heavenly. The album credits both Gilbert Becaud and Ray Stevens as the writers. There are a couple of sad love songs on the 1978 album and those are "Two Wrongs Don't Make a Right", more of a song of reconciliation, but we're not told if the pair patched things up or not. "Comeback" is a fast tempo song where Ray pleads and begs for the woman to comeback and don't hesitate. "The Feeling's Not Right Again" would become the name of Ray's 1979 compilation album on Warner Brothers but it made it's debut on Be Your Own Best Friend. The song deals with a man who can't seem to find his soul mate since every time he gets into a relationship it just doesn't have much feeling to it.
In the latter half of 1979 Ray moved to the RCA label. His first project for the label happened to be his first comedy album since 1974. Shriner's Convention hit early in 1980, the first all-comedy studio album from Ray since Boogity Boogity. The album featured the hit title track and a couple of other recordings became fan favorites. As far as love songs go there happened to be a couple of bizarre ones with it being a comedy album after all. One of the most clever love songs is "You're Never Goin' To Tampa With Me". The women in their southern accents pronounce the word, tamper, as tampa. So, when Ray hears all the women he encounters during Spring Break say that he's never going to tampa with them it confuses him...considering he wasn't planning on going to Tampa anyway. The song doubles as a neat tribute to Florida, though, as Ray name drops quite a lot of famed beaches and cities.
"The Last Laugh" has Ray singing about multiple ways he'll end his life as a result of being treated badly by a former lover. "Rita's Letter" is a song about a woman that receives a letter from her second husband telling her that he'd be in the neighborhood and would she like to reunite. Eventually they come face to face and she learns that he's changed his name from Beauregard to Nirvana and is part of a religious cult wearing a robe and pony tail. In "The Watch Song" Ray tells the story of being in a bar room fight. In the song Ray's accused of being the other man in a woman's life and her husband wants to fight. They fight and the guy breaks Ray's wristwatch and it causes him to snap. Ray beats the man up, too much it seems, because the guy dies. Ray's character finds himself headed to life in prison and an eventual death sentence. Throughout the song Ray wonders aloud and prays John Cameron Swayze will help him get out of prison and off death row.
Well, I couldn't let Saint Patrick's Day go by without at least composing a blog entry spotlighting not only this photo of Ray Stevens in green but shining the light on a music pot of gold...an audio pot of gold. A collection of recordings by Ray Stevens that capture the spirit of what most people over the many decades have come to identify Saint Patrick's Day with: drinking alcohol and throwing parties. The holiday is synonymous with the color, green. The Irish connection and the lore of leprechauns, shamrocks, pots of gold, and luck. Ray has never officially recorded Irish ballads or traditional Irish music. I haven't done any detailed research to find out why Saint Patrick's Day went from celebrating an actual Irish Saint named Patrick to a day that's long been tied to alcohol (public intoxication) and wild partying. Nevertheless, there are those who are authentically Irish who have no issue with the fun and craziness that surrounds the Irish holiday but there are those of Irish heritage that do not appreciate the 'image' of the Irish as intoxicated fools continuing to show up every year on March 17th. Some protest the stereotypical imagery associated with the holiday (shamrocks, leprechaun costumes, orange wigs and beards) but I believe the protests are coming from a loud vocal minority considering the holiday comes and goes each and every year with celebrations of Irish heritage (food, drinks, music, clothing) on the day marking the death of Saint Patrick (March 17th). My family's heritage (on my dad's side) is Irish-Scottish and I don't find anything offensive about how people choose to celebrate Saint Patrick's Day. Whether you simply want to wear green, or, drink alcohol, or listen to various recording artist's do a rendition of "Danny Boy", no matter how you choose to celebrate, well, it's perfectly fine with me.
What Ray Stevens songs do you think are in my personally selected pot of gold? I have a couple of songs in mind and the first one I'm spotlighting is Ray's rendition of "The Bricklayer's Song". Ray recorded this in 1993 on stage at his Branson, Missouri theater. It appears on his comedy album that year, Classic Ray Stevens. The song tells the story of an Irishman and his wild misadventures with a rope, a pulley, and a barrel of bricks.
Ray performed "The Bricklayer's Song" on an episode of his CabaRay Nashville television series but the performance isn't isolated as a stand alone upload on YouTube (so far) and I've forgotten which episode contains that performance. There are nearly 80 half hour episodes of the series so far. I could go through my notes and check which episode he performed it on...hey, I just went and looked...Ray performed the song on the episode guest starring Leroy Van Dyke. If you visit YouTube and search 'Ray Stevens + Leroy Van Dyke', the full episode will appear in the search results. Along the same amusing lines as that song but this time the setting is a brewery we hear the story of Clancy who works at a brewery in Milwaukee. We're told he's worked there for years and loves his job...working overtime and even weekends. Clancy met his end, however, in the most unfortunate of ways. You will hear all about it in Ray's 1987 recording of "The Day That Clancy Drowned", from the pen of Sheb Wooley.
Have you ever heard the Ray Stevens recording of "Little Brown Jug"? He recorded it for his massive box set in 2012 titled The Encyclopedia of Recorded Comedy Music. The song originated in 1869 but became closely linked to Glenn Miller in 1939. The Prohibition Era in the United States (roughly 1920 - 1933) naturally caused a lot of songs/imagery of alcohol to become popular due to the Government imposed ban on all things alcohol related. Oh yes, bootlegging became fashionable even if it was against the law. This recording from Ray features modern instrumentation but it captures the spirit of the previous recordings of decades ago...and with practically everything Ray records there's a lot put into the production and his vocal performance gives the song it's essential cheery overtone...
One of the recordings from Ray Stevens that I think about on Saint Patrick's Day is his 1984 recording of "Happy Hour is the Saddest Time of the Day". It's a song on his comedy album that year, He Thinks He's Ray Stevens. He performed it on a country music television show that year and during the performance he applies make-up in time with the music and eventually appears on camera, right in front of our eyes, as a sad clown which masks the hilarious, clever lyrics. The screen cap from the performance shows him in the clown make-up but it's fun to watch the performance and hear him sing about loss love and how happy hour brings sorrow instead of happiness...
Oh yes...perhaps the most popular or the second most popular woman from a Ray Stevens recording is Ethel. The woman that kept seeing a streaker in Ray's 1974 million selling single, "The Streak". The catchphrase, well one of them, even appears on the album cover. Throughout the recording Ray's eyewitness character continually warns Ethel not to look but it's always too late. Ray wrote and recorded a rough draft of the song shortly after reading about the fad of streaking prior to it becoming a national fad, most often happening on college campuses. Ray didn't immediately release the song but once streaking became a huge news item, perhaps reaching it's peak at the Oscar ceremony, Ray decided to put the finishing touches on his song and record it. When he released the song on Barnaby Records there were already at least a dozen or more novelty songs about streaking available. Ray has always felt that the reason his recording out performed the other songs is due to his having the concept of the song partially written weeks before streaking became a cultural phenomenon. He owed the song's success to having had the time to focus on it rather than cobbling together lyrics seemingly at random just to cash in on the fad. The single sold millions of copies worldwide. The sales figure that's often cited is more than 5,000,000 copies sold. It not only reached the top of the Hot 100 pop chart here in America but it crossed over and become a Top-5 hit in country music and a number one hit in the United Kingdom. In America the song was at number one for three weeks. It had a meteoric rise to the top...once it hit the Hot 100 it was sitting at number one within a month's time. The single reaches it's golden anniversary this year but for this occasion it's okay if Ethel takes a look and celebrates the milestone. Although the 1974 Boogity Boogity album is officially a comedy release it did contain at least one love song. It happens to be the album closer, "Just So Proud To Be Here". Ray also includes his rendition of "Don't Boogie Woogie", a rocking piano pounding performance that sounds a lot like Jerry Lee Lewis and ironically Jerry Lee Lewis would in fact record that song...one year after Ray. Here's an audio track of "Just So Proud To Be Here". I don't know if Ray chose to write a song with this as a title because of his friendship with Minnie Pearl or not. If you'd ever seen Minnie in performance she'd holler out her opening "How-dee!" and follow it with "I'm just so proud to be here...".
In 1975, still with Barnaby Records, Ray issued the single, "Misty". Now, technically, the name of the song is a woman's name but the song is actually about emotional feelings. If you've never heard the song before it's about how misty-eyed a man gets the moment the love of his life is near him. So, yes, it's still a love song but it isn't about a woman named Misty. Ray won a Grammy early in 1976 in the category of Best Music Arrangement for his recording of "Misty". Elsewhere on the Misty album there are plenty of love songs. One of the greatest on the album is his version of "Lady of Spain". There's also the delightful "Sunshine", a song that's arranged and sang with such vocal happiness that you're bound to smile throughout as you listen to it. On the opposite end of the up-tempo productions we have the sensual vibe that exists throughout his performance of "Take Care of Business". That song, from the pen of Layng Martine, Jr., uses a phrase heard throughout Ray's 1968 single, "Mr. Businessman". Layng was a writer at Ray's publishing company and if I recall correctly the songwriter chose "Take Care of Business" as a title because he felt it might grab Ray's attention to the point of his possibly recording the love ballad...or he used that title because "Mr. Businessman" happened to be one of Layng's favorite Ray Stevens songs. It's one or the other. Ray's marvelous ballad renditions of "Indian Love Call" and "Young Love" are on the 1975 album as well.
In 1976 Ray exited Barnaby Records and signed on with Warner Brothers records. His debut album for the label, seen above, is titled Just For the Record. It's a glorious album chock full of up-tempo, mid-tempo, and ballad performances. In the category of love songs this album has plenty. His rousing rendition of "You Are So Beautiful" was the album's debut single and it was followed by another love song, "Honky Tonk Waltz". A savory ballad found on here is "Once in Awhile" whereas "Cornball" is a bouncy sing-a-long kind of song where Ray sings about a guy that no matter how hard he tries he can't seem to impress the woman but he's so desperate that he feels the need to remind her that he'll always be available if she ever gets lonely. I tend to use the word, glorious, a lot when describing specific Ray Stevens recordings. I'll use that word again.. "Gimme a Smile" is a glorious love song about a strained relationship that's reached a breaking point and Ray asks for forgiveness and a smile.
So far I've touched on quite a few Ray Stevens recordings that fall into the category of a love song or those that contain women's names in the song titles in these first three blog entries focusing on Ray singing about women. In part 4 I'll be spotlighting some recordings of Ray during the years 1977, 1978, and 1980 as women's history month continues.
Hello once again Ray Stevens fans!! We're on the eve of the annual tradition of setting our clocks ahead one hour at 2am. I don't if the State you live in participates in the clock changes (spring forward/fall back) or not but it's something we've done for decades. One of the main points of this limited blog series was to spotlight some of the songs Ray Stevens has recorded that deal with women. I originally wanted to pinpoint songs that feature a woman's name in the title but then I figured I'd also toss in some notice to songs that are about women, in general, and therefore those would fall into the love song category.
Although a casual music listener probably wouldn't think of love songs or deep, romantic ballads when they hear the name, Ray Stevens, but he's recorded and written a lot of love songs. Some of those love songs actually do involve a lot of mature, straightforward lyrics. The issue has almost always been that music listeners can't separate the funny man from the serious one and once he gained a reputation for comedy/novelty it was almost written in stone in the ears and minds of music listeners and music critics that Ray shouldn't be taken seriously. We all know that Ray was able to overcome the novelty/comedy image throughout much of the 1970s and into the early 1980s. His recordings were very well done, immaculately produced, and arranged. Ray is his own music producer and music arranger and those talents continue to show up on his most recent recordings, too. I decided to use that particular pose of Ray because I feel it captures him deep in the performance. His eyes are open so you can't say he's lost in the feeling but it's a capture that captures a side of Ray Stevens that gets overlooked. So, then, in my second part of this mini-blog series devoted to women's history month we begin with a song Ray wrote and recorded in the late 1960s. The song originally appeared on his 1969 album, Have a Little Talk With Myself. "The Little Woman" celebrates the joy of domestic living and the pride one has in living a modest lifestyle. It also, as you'll find out when listening to the song, demonstrates the strength of a marriage. In the song's storyline Ray is approached by a woman who has perhaps a one night stand on her mind but he gently turns her down and states how much he loves his wife who's waiting on him at home. Ray explored this theme of domestic tranquility in a previous recording a year earlier in 1968 on the song, "The Great Escape". In that one he criticizes the hectic pace of working in the city and all that's one his mind is making the escape back to the tranquil suburbs and returning to his wife and their subdivided house. In the embed below it's the audio track of "The Little Woman".
In 1970 one of Ray's albums, Unreal, featured numerous love songs. One of them, in particular, dealt with the sad side of love. "Islands" tells the story of a couple who've drifted off into their own separate worlds. The woman has left the guy and the song is something of a lover's plea for her to return. Sad love songs tend to outnumber positive love songs on that 1970 album. A couple of other sad ones are "Night People", "Imitation of Life", and the war ballad "Loving You on Paper". The album had it's share of positive and inspiring songs, though, such as "Come Around", "Can We Get To That?", and "America, Communicate With Me". In the video clip below you'll hear Ray perform "Loving You On Paper" from a May 1971 episode of the BBC music series, In Concert.
In Ray's 1973 album, Nashville, there are all kinds of love songs on it. First off is the title track. "Nashville" isn't necessarily about a woman but it's a love song directed at the city of Nashville, Tennessee. In several interviews Ray mentioned that he wrote the song while touring Australia and was homesick. He missed being in Nashville and being with his family. Ray's take on "Never Ending Song of Love" is fabulous as is the love ballad "Love Me Longer". The album features the original recording of "You've Got the Music Inside" which he would re-record five years later. In the latter recording from 1978 he gave it a softer music arrangement to mirror his softer vocal performance.
As was the case in 1970 with the release of two albums Ray released two albums in 1973, too: Nashville and Losin' Streak. Some of the love songs on Losin' Streak were a re-recorded version of "Just One of Life's Little Tragedies" (originally recorded by Ray in 1963), "Idaho Wine", a mid-tempo recording of "Easy Loving", and a bluesy rendition of "Bye Bye Love". The Losin' Streak album isn't officially uploaded onto YouTube and neither is Have a Little Talk With Myself but if you manually search for songs from either of those two albums you'll come across the audio tracks. I'll follow up with part three later on this week.
Hello one and all...all you fans of Ray Stevens!! March is Women's History Month and I thought it would be neat/fun to take a look back in the long career of Ray Stevens and single out some of his recordings about women or those that have the names of women in their title. This is going to be a multi-part blog entry and so I'm not going to start off with the obvious ones. Also, as you could guess from the picture sleeve, I'll be going in chronological order from earliest to present day. Now, having said that, it doesn't mean that I'm going to spotlight each and every song dealing with the subject matter. It's just a sampling. In this first installment I'm focusing on three recordings in particular. The first comes from 1964 and was issued as a single only release. The song would eventually find it's way onto an album a few years later. "Bubble Gum the Bubble Dancer" is a novelty song about a bubble dancer. Ray tells us the story of how the dancer, named Bubble Gum, excites the patrons at a club called the Blue Rendezvous. As he's singing about how wild she's driving the men in the audience he adds in some vernacular from the time period such as using the term, cats, to describe the audience. He also gets in the slang expression, hullaballoo, which was such a recurring expression in the early to mid '60s that a television teenager dancer show was created with that title. When you hear the song, and even though it was recorded in the early 1960s and Ray's vocals and the music reflect this, there are moments in the song where you'll detect the phrasing that would come to the forefront in future recordings. When Ray gets to the line where he sings "..and then the music stopped and the house was still..", the way he enunciates the words, stopped and still, are certain to catch your ears. The B-side is a chilling song, "Laughing Over My Grave". Ray sings about a woman who's had enough and she has the man worried about what she's got planned for him. In his worst thoughts he thinks his days are numbered and he can hear her laughing over his grave.
In 1967, by now on the Monument record label, Ray released a single titled "Mary, My Secretary". In this toe-tapper of a song we hear Ray sing about how a secretary that works for him is creeping into his thoughts and is causing his eyes to drift toward her...and while he tries to hold back temptations he ends up once again calling his wife to explain that he's going to be late getting home, again. Ray belts out how his secretary, Mary, is breaking up his happy home. It was a single-only release. The other side of the single happened to be "Answer Me, My Love", a song that deals with a man pleading to his wife that he's never been unfaithful.
In 1970 Ray signed with the Barnaby Records label. In the final month of the year he released the novelty song "Bridget the Midget the Queen of the Blues". As is the case with most any single that's released within the last 2 or 3 months in a calendar year it reaches it's greatest peak in the first few months of the following year. Early in 1971 "Bridget the Midget the Queen of the Blues" peaked in the Top-50 of the Hot 100...reaching number 50, as a matter of fact. It reached the Top-10 in the United Kingdom...stalling in the runner-up position for several weeks. The song is about a tap dancer working at a Go-Go on Sunset Strip. Ray tells us about Bridget's success as he acts as the narrator and emcee spotlighting Bridget and her backup group, Strawberry and the Short Cakes. During various moments in the song the performance takes a backseat to a rabid fan, possibly drunk, who interjects his enthusiasm into the goings on. The fan hollers "Uh huh I dig it, I really dig it!!" to which Ray, acting as a combination emcee/security guard, hollers back "you can't do that, fella!!". Eventually as Bridget and her group dazzle with more tap dancing the fan hollers out how much he digs it and Ray hollers "watch out, fella, you can't come up on the stage!!!". It's a very funny novelty song written, produced, and arranged by Ray Stevens. It was originally released as a single-only late in 1970 and it wouldn't make it's appearance on a studio album until four years later. It was placed on the 1974 Boogity Boogity album.
He also made a limited animation music video of the song several decades later and I'm including it in this blog entry, too. I'll be writing part 2 of this blog series soon.
See the Country Music Hall of Fame member, Ray Stevens, kick off the final season of concerts at the CabaRay showroom. The final season kicks off on March 16th and there will be a total of five concerts from Ray during the month of March. Ray will appear in concert on March 16th, 21st, 23rd, 28th, and 30th. The concert season will run through December 2024 at which time the showroom will close. As far as I know there hasn't been any plans for what will occupy the showroom in the years to come. It'll more than likely remain under Ray's ownership as a place that he'll perform occasional concerts at and more than likely he'll have the showroom a destination for recording artists to perform at while they're on tour. The news of the final season of concerts broke last month. In case it's all new to you I'd suggest you read a news announcement HERE. That link will take you to the CabaRay webpage. Once there you'll be able to read the announcement as well as browse the site and perhaps decide to purchase concert tickets for an upcoming show in 2024.
The photo of Ray that you see in the upper right is from induction night at the Country Music Hall of Fame in 2019. In addition to the plaque that is placed inside the Hall of Fame building each member also receives a gold medallion. In each successive year following the creation of the gold medallion ceremony it's encouraged that Hall of Fame members return each year, wearing their medallions, to witness the induction of new members into the Hall of Fame. See the previous paragraph for a link to the CabaRay webpage.
Hello Ray Stevens fans!! I felt like doing a visual promo for one of the four CD's in Ray's 2021 box set, Iconic Songs of the 20th Century. As you can see it's the bluegrass CD titled Melancholy Fescue. It had been awhile since I had given some attention to that particular 2021 release. The main focal point of this blog entry, however, centers around a radio appearance from Ray Stevens on February 12 last week. It was the day after the Super Bowl as you'll hear when you listen to the interview. Bill Cody hosts a morning radio program on 650 WSM radio and it has a simulcast on television. There wasn't any sort of alert that Ray would be a guest on Bill's radio program and so I wasn't able to write any kind of blog entry promoting the appearance. I found out yesterday and I shared the YouTube link to several people that I know of who are as much a fan of Ray Stevens as I happen to be. As is the case with almost every interview that features Ray it's an up-tempo, light conversation filled with jokes or whimsical phrases. When you listen to the interview you'll discover that there will be some major activity taking place in Ray's career come the summer of 2024. There are actually two breaking news releases in the interview. The first is the completed production of a music video with the resident pianist at Ray's CabaRay showroom, John Jonethis. Ray didn't reveal when the video would be released. He says he'll be in the video but he didn't say whether he'd be a vocalist for John's performance or if he'd simply appear in the video in a non-singing role.
The second breaking news announcement during the interview was the upcoming production of all-new episodes of CabaRay Nashville!! Ray revealed starting July of this year he'll be taping all kinds of footage for 26 new episodes of the half hour television series. The program had been on hiatus/out of production since 2018. There were 78 half hour episodes produced, initially, of Ray's half hour television series. The series first aired in the latter half of 2015 on RFD-TV and then in first-run syndication on local PBS stations. The first 26 half hour episodes aired on RFD-TV, titled Ray Stevens' Nashville, and then 52 half hour episodes aired in PBS syndication often on Saturday or Sunday afternoon or, in some markets, evening time-slots week, as Ray Stevens CabaRay Nashville.
The PBS airings were scattered all over the local landscape and it was difficult for a lot of fans to see the program due to it not airing in national syndication. The show would air in local television markets on PBS meaning that fans in one State were able to see the program whereas fans in another State might've not had any PBS affiliate airing the show. The final handful of episodes were taped early in 2018 at the CabaRay showroom. Ray eventually brought all of the episodes to his YouTube channel and he premiered an episode every week on the channel. These YouTube airings were, for many fans, the first time they'd seen the PBS episodes given how scattered the airings/availability had been. Since the episodes of his TV show are part of his YouTube channel there's no reason why any fan with internet access hasn't watched all the episodes by now.
Now, with the announcement that there will be 26 additional episodes produced, that'll bring the overall total number of episodes to 104. It wasn't revealed if these additional episodes will air on television or if they'll air on his YouTube channel once a week. There's a lot of information we still don't know but isn't it fun knowing that Ray will be producing episodes of the TV show again?
In the interview with Bill Cody you'll want to start the video clip at the 37 minute, 11 second mark which is where Ray's portion of the show begins. Now, of course, you can listen to the entire video upload with Bill's other guests, too, but if you're just wanting to hear Ray's portion of the show it begins at 37 minutes, 11 seconds.
Hello fans of Ray Stevens!! Over the course of the last several days there had been several new articles posted online focusing on the upcoming final concert season at the CabaRay showroom. The 2024 season gets underway next month...exactly one month from today. The first concert of the season is scheduled to happen on March 16, 2024. Now, in case you've been following his social media, then you're aware that Ray opened the CabaRay for a special Valentine's Day concert a couple of days ago. It was a one night event and, as previously mentioned, the full 2024 concert season gets underway on March 16th. Ray will perform at the CabaRay on Thursday and Saturday nights. The Thursday concerts are scattered throughout the season but the Saturday concerts will be an every week thing. There are some Thursday events at the CabaRay that center around The Indie Country Showdown. So, once you visit Ray's main CabaRay webpage and search for concert dates make sure the selection is for the Ray Stevens concert. I say that because I figure most of you are going to want to show up for a concert from Ray...but, if you prefer to show up for one of the Thursday nights that The Indie Country Showdown will be taking place you're perfectly free to make the choice. You can read all about the 2024 season of concerts by clicking HERE.
In case you're wondering there isn't a CD single of "If Jesus Is a Stranger". This song and a couple of other releases have been appearing on various digital music sites with an accompanying photo. The photo's are used for publicity/promotional purposes only...there isn't a physical copy of a CD single.
The CabaRay final season was the subject of a story on local Nashville television station, WTVF, Channel 5. Well, at first, a transcript/printed copy of the report appeared online and then the televised report shown up on YouTube. I'm not going to provide a link to the TV station's webpage. I realize that with so many fans out there having various operating systems bringing them their online content that the TV station's webpage may react differently depending on what device a fan uses. So, then, I'm going to provide a link to the YouTube video. I'm including a link due to the fact that a lot of us like to see Ray on camera talking, or, listening to his voice on a radio program as he's being interviewed. The video is three minutes in length. The TV station doesn't allow embedded video content to be shared and so I'm going to provide a link.. click HERE. The link should take you to the YouTube video but just in case it doesn't you can always Google the phrase 'Ray Stevens + WTVF' and among the search results will be the recent video clip, as of this writing.
Hello fans of Ray Stevens!! We welcome in the month of February with some exciting news. Ray's current music video, "Since Bubba Changed His Name to Charlene", has officially reached the half a million unique views plateau. As of this writing the unique views are sitting at 502,346. Although I hadn't been writing any blog entries displaying the progress of the music video's unique views I would often check in and take note of whatever the latest numbers shown. A couple of months ago on November 16, 2023 to be specific the music video had reached 369,028 unique views. The video was uploaded onto YouTube on October 5, 2023 and so more than a month after it had made it's debut it was already well over 300,000. I checked the numbers during early December 2023 and it was sitting at 455,431 unique views on December 9th. Several days ago on January 22, 2024 the unique views count was sitting at 491,691 and so I had a feeling that the music video would reach half a million at some point and it officially reached that plateau late last night. I took note of it and it was sitting at 501,601 unique views right around this time Wednesday night. As pointed out at the top of this blog entry it's now sitting at 502,346.
As of this writing this song only exists as a music video and as a digital download. An image of Ray with his hand covering his mouth, to convey a shocked expression, is being used as a promo picture for the digital download. There isn't a CD hardcopy available for those of you out there that might be curious/wondering. In fact, as of this writing, there hasn't been any information on any future comedy albums...and if any would be released I'm sure that this song will be among the track list.
