Ray Stevens: Singing about Women, Part 2

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.  

Ray Stevens: Music Country at 50

Earlier in the year I highlighted the 50th anniversary of Ray's 1973 album, Nashville. Off to the right is a cassette copy showing the record company, Barnaby, and the distributor, MGM, on the cover. When writing that blog entry I don't recall if I made mention of Ray's appearance on the summer replacement show of Dean Martin. The summer show, Dean Martin Presents Music Country, ran during the summer of 1973. Online data indicates that Ray appeared on this show in July 1973...and there's a magazine advertisement that was circulated at the time promoting Ray's upcoming appearance. The ad promoted not only the upcoming television appearance but also promoted the fact that Ray would be singing his current single, "Nashville". Dean's summer show aired on NBC-TV. Now, as we're several weeks away from 2023 turning to 2024, a question forms in my mind: is there any footage of Ray's performance of "Nashville" from Dean Martin's summer show? When you look up information about the July 1973 episodes of that particular series you don't get too much information beyond what seems to be a randomly selected list of guest stars. If I recall correctly the magazine advertisement stated something along the lines of: "Stop! Look! Listen...to Ray Stevens as he sings his new hit, Nashville, on Dean Martin Presents Music Country on NBC-TV". Now, that's going from memory, I'm sure it's not word for word accurate. I've touched on this several times over the years that I've had this fan created blog page up and running and it's the lack of Ray Stevens footage on video hosting sites. I should be more specific, though. The lack of footage from variety shows that we, as fans, know that he guest starred on in his career. Ray's official social media pages has a lot of footage, obviously, but even their library of appearances isn't complete. 

Now, not counting the footage from the 1973 Dean Martin summer show, there are dozens of television appearances from everything from Hee Haw and Pop! Goes the Country to telecasts of the Music City News Awards, Crook and Chase, Nashville Now, and locally produced television programs that still haven't become available online. There is a 1991 episode of Nashville Now, for example, that Ray guest hosted but it has never surfaced on the internet...not even a clip or two, let alone the full episode. Am I impatient? Do I feel ungrateful for the things that are online? No, I'm thrilled and grateful for what's out there on the internet at the moment, I'm just impatient. 

I'm a dedicated fan of Ray Stevens that yearns to see more and more footage. 

Ray Stevens: Eye Catching Song Titles and More...

Hello fans of Ray Stevens!! I touched on this topic more than a decade ago so it's long since been buried in the archives so I thought I'd bring the topic back.. and that's the topic of funny/strange/eye-catching song titles that have appeared on the albums of Ray Stevens over the decades. It may not have hit you yet but the legendary Ray Stevens has entertained us for nearly 8 decades: '50s, '60s, '70s, 80s, 90s, 00's, 10's, and since 2020 we can now include the '20s. Mathematically, as you can see, he's three years into that 8th decade of entertainment. Ray's 1973 album, Nashville, is first in this blog entry about eye catching song titles. On that particular release, which is a non-comedy album, we have songs titled "Destroyed", "Fish Eat Sleep", and "Float". 

1978's There Is Something On Your Mind isn't a comedy album from Ray Stevens. However, it's an album that if you're not familiar with the songs you'd think some of them were comical due to their titles. The title track has some humorous moments which are much more notable within the final minutes when Ray launches into the frantic monologue describing the mindset of the guy who learns that he's the victim of a woman's cheating. Elsewhere on the 1978 album are songs with titles such as "Money Honey", "Your Cash Ain't Nothin' But Trash", and a trio of medley performances referred to as trilogies. The one medley with what some would consider a comical title is "Banned in Boston Trilogy". This performance features a medley of three songs that Ray, in the liner notes of the vinyl album, said were originally banned on numerous radio stations. The songs in the medley are "Sixty Minute Man", "Work With Me Annie", and "Annie Had a Baby". The 1978 album wasn't heavily promoted at all but had it been it would've most likely been described as a covers album of '50s and '60s rhythm and blues... a music format which Ray is a big fan of. In the written introduction found above Ray's photo on the vinyl release he, and I'm paraphrasing, made the album to bring some seriousness back to the music that he feels had gotten lost or downplayed due to a lot of the then current parodies of the 1950's/1960's time period. 

On the 1980 Shriners Convention album, which is a comedy album, eye-catching song titles are plentiful. The one that grabs the eye most often is "Put It In Your Ear". Now, leave it to Ray Stevens to record a song with a title like that but vocally perform it as a serious love ballad. The song's writer is Layng Martine, Jr. The 1980 album also has songs with these titles: "Coin Machine", "You're Never Goin' To Tampa With Me", "The Dooright Family", and "The Watch Song". In 1984 Ray began the phase of his career where he intentionally began marketing himself as a comic performer. Although comedy/novelty had come to define him in the minds of many music listeners well before 1984 it was something he actively worked against... always wanting to show that he could write, sing, and perform serious works as well. Then, in 1984, he figured that if comedy and off-the-wall music is what the general public want from him then that's what he'll give them. Ray had signed to MCA Records in 1984. All but one of the albums Ray recorded during the years 1984 through 1989 were all comedy. His 1989 album was half comedy, half serious ballads. 

Some of the eye catching and possibly strange song titles on those comedy albums were: "Mississippi Squirrel Revival", "Erik the Awful", "Ned Nostril", "Punk Country Love", "Kiss a Pig", "Hugo the Human Cannonball", "Bionie and the Robotics", "Smoky Mountain Rattlesnake Retreat", "Dudley Dorite of the Highway Patrol", "Would Jesus Wear a Rolex?", "Three Legged Man", "Cool Down Willard", "Language, Nudity, Violence, and Sex", "Booger Man", "Blood and Suede", "Mama's in the Sky With Elvis", "I Saw Elvis in a U.F.O.", "I Used To Be Crazy", and "The Woogie Boogie".

What I've noticed for years is what I call the Ray Stevens fanbase vernacular. This is when a fan of Ray's will speak in short hand and never say the exact title of a song but will refer to the song by it's subject matter or some lyric they remember. It's mostly a phenomenon on the internet by those who discover Ray's songs through the music videos that have been added to many video hosting sites. A lot those people perhaps have no idea of who Ray actually is and simply know of him by way of some video they've come across on social media sites. This segment of society more than likely will refer to Ray's 2010 music video, "Come to the U.S.A.", as the anti-illegal immigration song rather than by it's actual name. "Mississippi Squirrel Revival" is often simply called "The Squirrel Song".. and I've seen online commentary from those that have seen Ray in concert and they'll inevitably say something like "Yes!! I saw Ray Stevens in concert and I'm glad he sang the song about the squirrel". The 1993 song, "If 10 Percent is Good Enough for Jesus", is referred to by people as "the Ray Stevens song about Jesus and taxes". Another potential example is his 2021 recording, "Dis-Connected". I call it a potential example because earlier today Ray spotlighted the audio recording on his social media sites. In time I'm sure "Dis-Connected" will be referred to as "that Ray Stevens song about online dating".  

Ray Stevens: "Nashville" is Golden

Hello Ray Stevens fans! Earlier this year I wrote a blog entry spotlighting the 50th anniversary of the 1973 album, Losin' Streak. Those of you familiar with Ray's career probably know that he released two albums in 1973. Losin' Streak arrived in the second half of the year whereas in the first half he gave us, Nashville. The Nashville album wasn't as big of a surprise if you happened to have been a long time fan of Ray when the album was released or had seen him in concert. Ray had been living in Nashville since 1962 and was well known up and down Music Row. He was an active session musician throughout the bulk of the 1960s and had formed long lasting friendships with record producers and musicians throughout Nashville as well as in Muscle Shoals, Alabama. His most publicized friendship was with RCA's Chet Atkins but Ray was also a friend to several other record producers/music executives including Ken Nelson (Prep/Capitol Records), Shelby Singleton (Mercury Records), Fred Foster (Monument Records), Jerry Kennedy (Mercury Records), and of course Bill Lowery, the man largely responsible for Ray getting into the recording industry in Georgia back in the late 1950s. Those people along with Andy Williams, Ralph Emery, Mike Sheppard, and scores of people behind the scenes that most of us may never know about were vital to the career of Ray Stevens. Ray, given his position in the music industry, also personally knew a whole host of other record producers and executives that had little to do with his own career but nevertheless the music industry back then guaranteed that singer-songwriter-musicians-publishers, such as Ray Stevens, would run into all types of movers and shakers in Music City. 

Ray's session musician workload began to diminish by 1970 and in several interviews Ray makes it clear that it was his own decision to decrease both the session work and his music arranging for other recording artists because his own career demanded more of his time and attention. 

In 1973 Ray opened up his first recording studio...and Nashville holds the distinction of being the first Ray Stevens studio album to be recorded at a studio he owned. It was called The Ray Stevens Sound Laboratory. Now, just so you won't be confused, that was a name that he used, professionally, for his first recording studio and then when he opened up his second studio the following year he kept that name. He used that studio title on up into the late 1970s. His 1977 studio album, Feel the Music, was the last one that credited the recording studio as The Ray Stevens Sound Laboratory. The albums released beginning in 1978 onward credited it as The Ray Stevens Studio. 

The Nashville album came at a time when country music and pop music, to some people's ears, couldn't be distinguished from one another. Now, if you go back and listen to 1973 country and 1973 pop you can clearly tell the difference...but not in the ears of some. The pop influence in country eventually led to the creation of a syndicated TV series, Pop! Goes the Country. Ray had been charting pop and Adult-Contemporary, on and off, since 1961...but in 1969 one of his singles, "Sunday Mornin' Comin' Down", crossed over to the country chart and this was followed by another appearance on the country chart with "Have a Little Talk With Myself". Then, later in 1970, his mega number one hit, "Everything is Beautiful", reached the country Top-40...and then in 1971 he hit the country charts with his gospel single, "Turn Your Radio On". He made his debut as a guest on the country music show, Hee Haw, in 1972...appearing on the show twice that year. I meticulously make mention of all of these things to reinforce my earlier comment that 'pop singer' Ray Stevens releasing Nashville in 1973 wasn't as big of a surprise as it may have seemed. 

He had been selling music/albums to country audiences and had wide appeal within the umbrella of country music even though, as far as country radio was concerned, his appeal with country audiences fell on deaf ears to them most of the time. No one will convince me that Ray Stevens wasn't attracting country fans during the hey-day of his 'pop' stardom in the early and mid 1970s...his appearances on numerous country music television programs of that era attest to his familiarity with the country audience. As far as chart statistics are concerned I blame country radio for not supporting his music as much as they could have or should have. They supported "Nashville", the single, and it made it's way into the country Top-40. What a recording artist needed was the sales support of the public combined with the airplay support of radio disc jockeys and, later on, radio consultants and radio programmers. Ray almost always had the public support...if you gauge the chart activity on numerous singles he released they'd rise up almost near the Top-50 or Top-40 but with the lack of airplay support the single releases would just die mid-level and not reach the airplay-driven Top-40 portion of the singles chart. 

The music on Nashville is not traditional country music nor is it 'pop music'...it is Ray Stevens music. There are 11 tracks on the album and because the overall album is meant to be influenced by country music you're going to hear some steel guitar on a couple of the songs...

1. Nashville

2. Love Me Longer

3. Float (instrumental)

4. Golden Age

5. Never Ending Song of Love

6. Nobody's Fool

7. Undivided Attention

8. You've Got the Music Inside

9. Fish Eat Sleep

10. Piece By Piece

11. Destroyed

The album is available to listen to on YouTube. The playlist can be accessed when you click this LINK. I'm embedding one of the audio tracks below because I want it to get a bit more spotlight here and that track is his rendition of "Never Ending Song of Love". His take on the song is quite a take! 

Ray Stevens: The Golden Losin' Streak Remembrance

Ray Stevens rocks out in this 1973 photograph...a close-up of the image appearing on his Losin' Streak album. That particular album reaches 50 this year and I'm giving a golden anniversary remembrance to that one of a kind album. If you follow Ray's career then you're very aware of how obscure, under-rated, and unheralded this 1973 album happens to be in comparison to some of his other albums of the same time period. Ray remarked that the album's title ironically described his recording career at that moment in time. He remarked that he was on a commercial losing streak...but no matter...his artistic display more than make up for it. This album was recorded in what Ray nicknamed The Ray Stevens Sound Laboratory. He had recently opened up his own recording studio after having spent years recording in numerous studios along Music Row. He would also rent out the studio to other record producers and artists. Ray kept this studio open for several years even though he personally stopped recording at the location a year later, in 1974, when he opened up a studio on Grand Avenue. That studio remained his base of operations for 45 years until 2019. The production of Losin' Streak was originally meant to be a focal point had the album been promoted as it should have been. There are several songs on this album that play around with Ray's vocalization...and the music arrangements and the overall sound all carry an experimental flavor. The albums Ray released before and after Losin' Streak lack the specific sound heard throughout this album. The album features an instrumental track that Ray composed, "Laid Back". 

Now, for those who like to be picky, the 1973 album is officially titled Ray Stevens featuring Losin' Streak but I prefer to just call it Losin' Streak. The album contains 11 songs...and Ray is the writer of 5 of the songs. Although Ray had always included songs written by others on his albums it's worth noting that on this particular album and in another album released the same year he was expanding and including more songs from other writers. One writer in particular being Layng Martine, Jr. The tracks "Being Friends" and "Idaho Wine" were from the pen of Layng Martine, Jr. It was in 1973 that Ray 'discovered' Layng Martine, Jr. and signed him to his publishing company (Ahab Music, Co.). The story goes that Layng sought out Ray and said how much of a fan he happened to be and that he wanted to write songs for Ray. Ray published almost every song Layng wrote in this early '70s time period and the biggest Layng Martine, Jr. song Ray published, as far as airplay and sales is concerned, turned out to be "Rub It In", a song that became a massive hit for Billy 'Crash' Craddock. Ray had actually produced a recording of the song by Layng Martine, Jr. but it wasn't a major hit. It reached the charts, though. Now, getting back to Ray's Losin' Streak album... the album's title track, "Losin' Streak", wasn't written by Ray Stevens as some may have thought. The song was written by a writer named Nick Van Maarth. The title track has a very memorable electric guitar and steel guitar blending together...and the up-tempo performance sets the mood for most of the album. "This is Your Life", one of the songs Ray wrote, is the song I imagine Ray is singing on the album's cover. The song contains a shouter of a chorus...some may say he's belting out the lyrics. One of the themes throughout the album is inspiration. "This is Your Life" is a song of inspiration but the one that has inspiration all over it is another Ray Stevens composition, "Inside". Tupper Saussy wrote the positive, reassuring "Things Work Out". Ray brings back a song he originally recorded in 1963, the self-penned "Just One of Life's Little Tragedies". It's a partial re-write, too, as he changes some of the lyrics in the last half of the song in addition to giving it a new music arrangement. Ray also gives a new arrangement to "Bye Bye Love", the classic pop hit by The Everly Brothers. In Ray's rendition the song is changed from an up-tempo sing-a-long to a bluesy ballad. The self-penned "What Do You Know?" closes out the 1973 album. 

I'm closing this blog entry with a couple of audio tracks. One of the tracks is "This is Your Life". Listen to Ray's performance and take in the glorious music arrangement. I'm also going to include the audio track of "Inside". That song would eventually end up as a B-side to a 1974 single-only release from Ray titled "Everybody Needs a Rainbow". The A-side was written by Layng Martine, Jr. The YouTube audio tracks were uploaded by another Ray Stevens fan named Randall Hamm.

 

Ray Stevens: 1 Day Until Musicians Hall of Fame Induction...

Hello once again and welcome to Part Two...now we're only 1 day away until Ray Stevens is inducted into the Musicians Hall of Fame. If you read my Part One blog entry you may have come away with the impression that I was very broad (not detailed) in my overview of Ray's career time-line from 1955 through 1979. I have a detailed career time-line of Ray that runs along the side of the blog. It begins in 1955 and every so often I'll add an image to the time-line which represents a specific year. When Ray releases a new album or single I'll add the publicity image to the time-line. Anyway, I didn't want to be too detailed in my Part One blog since that's the function of the pictorial time-line. Toward the end of the last blog entry I brought up Ray's push into the country music mainstream as the mid 1970's rolled around. His friendship with Chet Atkins lasted decades. The two were often spotted together at music industry functions and gala's...and unless you're well detailed in the career/life of Ray Stevens then you may not know that the two were business partners in a string of real estate properties all over Nashville. In music industry publications some of the writers half-jokingly nicknamed Ray the Landlord of Music Row. Nashville is an album Ray released on Barnaby Records in 1973. I consider it his first major step into the country music format. The album's overall feel is in line with what Nashville was promoting as country music at the time. Ray was the producer and arranger on the album as he had been on his last several studio albums. "Nashville" was the main single release and it's become a mainstay in his concerts...but it had gone under the radar for several decades before Ray brought it back to the forefront of his career several years ago. It was a country music hit...it didn't appear on the pop chart. Ray was in the process of recording studio ownership around this time. He opened up a studio called The Ray Stevens Sound Laboratory. 

Some of his pop music releases crossed over to the country audience and I feel the friendship he had with Ralph Emery was a factor. Ralph was a very influential country music disc jockey and country music television host...and typically if a song was heard on Ralph's broadcasts chances were other disc jockeys around the country picked up on it. 

"Sunday Mornin' Comin' Down", as mentioned in Part One, was the first single of Ray's to appear on a country music chart. The single charted pop in America and in Canada as well as country in America and Canada. The Canadian RPM publication had Ray's single ranked higher on their pop and country chart's indicating that it either had more sales or more airplay in Canada than here in the United States. If you search weekly chart publications you'll find all kinds of interesting tidbits revolving around single and album releases in Ray's career. Since his career bounced all over the music spectrum you'll find that an album or single might do well in one format but not even appear in another...but then, by the next release, the format that didn't embrace the previous single may embrace the following single and vice versa. Ray's next country appearance came with "Have a Little Talk With Myself"...and though it's appearance on the weekly country chart was brief the fact that his singles were breaking into country music as early as 1969 suggested his wide appeal. 

1970's "Everything is Beautiful" was a multi-week number one pop hit, a multi-week Adult-Contemporary number one, and it reached the music charts internationally...and it, too, crossed over to the country chart and reached the Top-40 in that format. A series of gospel singles in 1971 hit pop and adult-contemporary...with one, "Turn Your Radio On", pulling a triple-prize by charting pop, adult-contemporary, and country. In the country market the single hit the Top-20. Two preceding singles "All My Trials" and "A Mama and a Papa" both reached the Top-10 on the Adult-Contemporary charts both here in the United States and in Canada. His rock and roll arrangement of "Love Lifted Me" was also a hit...but in Bangkok of all places. Billboard magazine's Hits of the World shows the single listed on Bangkok's music chart for multiple weeks. Ray's international publicity took him all over the globe in the early to mid 1970s. As you see here it's a March 1971 issue of a Sydney, Australia tourist guide with Ray Stevens on the cover. Later on Ray wrote the song, "Nashville", a song I mentioned earlier, during one of his lengthy overseas tours. Ray is quoted as saying he wrote the song because he was homesick for Nashville. Ray plays the piano, keyboard, and synthesizer and is credited as one of the musicians in almost all of his albums. He is also credited with being the record producer and music arranger. His first producer credit, as far as his own recordings are concerned, come along in 1968. Specifically it was a co-producer credit with Fred Foster on the Even Stevens album. That is the album that introduced a general public that never bothered to play the B-side of singles a chance to hear a serious side of Ray Stevens. Serious songs often appeared as the B-side of his novelty songs throughout his years at Mercury and during the earliest years of his recording career on Monument (which began in 1965) but Even Stevens was an entire album of non-comedy and it's main single was the pop hit, "Mr. Businessman". Fred Foster, Ray Stevens, and Jim Malloy were the record producers on the Gitarzan comedy album. Ray's final studio album for Monument, Have a Little Talk With Myself, was produced by Ray with co-production by Jim Malloy. Ray's first studio album where he was the sole record producer happened to be Everything is Beautiful, released in the summer of 1970. The Mercury singles and two studio albums (1961-1965) were produced by Shelby Singleton...with some single releases featuring co-production by Jerry Kennedy. 

From 1970 onward Ray has been the main producer of all of his albums and the music arranger on all of his recordings...with the exception of two back to back albums in 1982 and 1983. Don't Laugh Now, from 1982 on RCA Records, featured co-production work from Bob Montgomery. Me, from 1983 on Mercury Records, featured co-production work from Jerry Kennedy. The 1982 album was Ray's third for RCA. A few years earlier, in 1980, Ray was the recipient of two career recognition awards. The Georgia Music Hall of Fame as well as the Nashville Songwriters Hall of Fame. Ray's exquisite Don't Laugh Now is so good...there's a mix of all kinds of styles on the album. The opening track is his catchy take on "Such a Night". The album features a novelty song in "Where The Sun Don't Shine" and a series of love ballads including the hit single, "Written Down in My Heart". 

Ray's deep dive into country music comedy began in the latter half of 1984 when he joined MCA Records. It was on this record label where Ray's albums took center stage as each of his releases on the label entered the Country Albums chart...with two of the albums reaching Top-10 status and almost all of them having long chart runs. It is also on MCA Records that the sales of his albums were so large that several of them eventually achieved Gold and Platinum certification. As unbelievable as it may sound Ray's 1981, 1982, and 1983 studio albums didn't appear on the weekly album charts. So, when 1984's He Thinks He's Ray Stevens debuted on Billboard's Country Albums chart it marked his first appearance on the chart with a studio album since Shriner's Convention in 1980. A 1983 Greatest Hits album, on RCA, became a hit. 

Ray's career branched out into different avenues in the 1990s. The decade of the 1980s was dominated, mostly, with his comedy albums for MCA and his consecutive wins as Comedian of the Year by the readers of Music City News magazine and viewers of The Nashville Network. In the 1990s he signed with Curb Records and he revealed his plans for building a theater in Branson, Missouri. The theater opened to the public in the summer of 1991. This led Ray into the realm of VHS tape. He produced and starred in a collection of music videos and sold them on VHS under the title Comedy Video Classics in 1992. VHS reporters for the music industry cited Ray's VHS as being revolutionary. Television commercials played on hundreds of television stations and at all hours of the day and night. It became a multi-million seller through direct marketing and when it was released to retail stores in 1993 it repeated the same success. Billboard named the VHS it's Video of the Year in 1993. Ray Stevens Live!, part of a concert at his former theater in Branson, Missouri, was sold on VHS and was certified Double-Platinum through direct marketing. In audio that decade Ray recorded three studio albums for Curb Records. He performed at his Branson theater for three seasons (1991, 1992, and 1993). Here's video of Ray at the piano performing "Yakety Sax/Yakety Axe" along side Chet Atkins and Boots Randolph. It's from an episode of Nashville Now...you'll see the show's host, Ralph Emery, at the beginning of the video.

Ray returned to MCA Records late in 1996 and recorded two albums for them and released more comedy music videos. He had marked his return to MCA with the retail release of his VHS tape, Get Serious!, which was sold through direct marketing in 1995. It was certified Double-Platinum. 

When Ray goes into the Musicians Hall of Fame tomorrow we'll all be excited but we also know that Ray's career will continue to move along. He'll continue performing concerts at his CabaRay showroom in West Nashville and his songs will continue to be discovered by thousands of people who search the internet for 'comedy songs', 'comedy music', 'funny songs', etc. I deliberately cut off my overview of Ray's career in the mid 1990s because I feel I've written a detailed overview without it turning into an entire career retrospective. I'm hoping the Musicians Hall of Fame will give Ray's career an in-depth going over tomorrow...but even if they don't it's still going to be exciting to know that Ray's being recognized for his career by such a prestigious organization.   

Ray Stevens: Vinyl LP Look Back...

If you're familiar with this fan created blog or if you're familiar with all of the studio albums released by Ray Stevens then you probably know about this 1973 vinyl LP, Losin' Streak. It remains a rare item in that it's never been made available on CD format nor has it officially been uploaded as a digital album on any online music site. This is notable due to the fact that Ray's other studio albums released on Barnaby Records have been issued in CD format and they're available at online music stores and streaming sites. Losin' Streak has never gotten that re-issue treatment. The album was recorded at a studio that Ray nicknamed 'The Ray Stevens Sound Laboratory'. It was a studio located close to the recording studio he opened the following year on Grand Avenue in downtown Nashville in 1974. Losin' Streak, because of it's lack of availability, has become a rarity. There are audio tracks of the album on YouTube...a fellow fan of Ray Stevens uploaded the audio tracks almost 10 years ago...but that's it. You won't find the album listed among Amazon, Spotify, Pandora, Itunes, or other music streaming sites. It's a shame, too...and you're probably not surprised that I'd say that. I champion the release of all Ray Stevens recordings onto modern-day listening devices and onto contemporary online music services. If you have the vinyl album, as I do, you'll note that the track list on the front of the album isn't exactly listed in chronological order. 

One of the things you'll notice right away...it's a 1973 vinyl album but in this photograph Ray Stevens has a beard...and a very thick beard at that. When you see photographs of Ray in the early and mid 1970s with a beard it causes him to look as if the photo was taken at a later time. You may think it's another way of saying he looked older with a beard...but I always felt that his beard in that time period caused him to visually look more recognizable to all of the fans he gained in the 1980s and 1990s who were not as familiar with a clean shaven Ray Stevens. Even today, if a clean shaven image of Ray is posted on a social media site, most of the commentary is filled with shock reactions...like it's the first time they've seen him without a beard. 

The back of the 1973 album shows us a completely different pose. Here Ray Stevens looks somber, studious, quaint...compared to the belting out, rocker-type of pose on the front of the album. I made mention that the front of the album contained an out of order track list. On Side 1 there are five songs: "Losin' Streak", "Just One Of Life's Little Tragedies", "Inside", "Things Work Out", and his bluesy rendition of "Bye Bye Love". On Side 2 there are six recordings: "Being Friends", "Idaho Wine", "This Is Your Life", and instrumental titled "Laid Back", "Easy Lovin'", and "What Do You Know?". Ray Stevens was listed as the album's producer and music arranger. Unfortunately this album lacks a musician credit list. It's safe to assume that Ray played piano, synthesizer, organ...any instrument in the piano family. When you listen to the audio track of "This Is Your Life" you'll hear a heavily produced song...the technology infused into the recording was unlike anything heard on any country or pop song of that era. This was yet another example of the production skills and music arranging skills of Ray Stevens. There's a memorable whip or a crack sound in that recording. I have no idea if it was accomplished by striking a chair with an actual whip...or placing a microphone on the floor of the studio and striking the floor with a whip...or whatever. It is probably a sound effect from a synthesizer. 

When you listened to that song did you take notice of the cracking sound effect? I just thought of something...maybe that cracking sound effect was accomplished by folding a belt and snapping it. I used to that a lot with my dad's belts. I'd have the belt folded in both my hands...push my hands together until a loop formed in the belt...and then pull my hands apart real fast and the belt would make a cracking sound. I've never asked anyone on Ray's social media because I don't think anyone would be able to specifically pinpoint how that sound came about on a Ray Stevens song from 1973. If you're curious about the songwriting credits. On Side One: The funky title track with the lilting steel guitar solos was written by Nick Van Maarth. Tupper Saussy wrote "Things Work Out". Ray Stevens wrote "Inside" and "Just One Of Life's Little Tragedies". The standard, "Bye Bye Love", was written by Boudleaux and Felice Bryant. On Side Two: Layng Martine, Jr. wrote "Being Friends" and "Idaho Wine". Freddie Hart wrote "Easy Lovin'" and Ray Stevens wrote the other three.. "What Do You Know?", "Laid Back", and "This Is Your Life". The writer of the title track, "Losin' Streak", also wrote a song Ray recorded for his previous album, Nashville. Ray recorded Nick Van Maarth's "Love Me Longer". Interestingly, when the songwriter previously recorded it, the title of the song was "Lay Lady Lay Down". 

If you go to YouTube and type in the phrase, Ray Stevens + Losin' Streak, you'll get audio tracks from the album in the search results. As of now, unless you have the vinyl album of Losin' Streak, these YouTube audio tracks are the only way to hear these rare, under-rated Ray Stevens recordings. You can thank Randall Hamm for uploading these audio tracks onto YouTube. He knew how rare they were back when he uploaded them. Here's Ray Stevens giving us some inspiration with "Inside"...

Ray Stevens: Vintage 1970s Photo...

It's me once again!! This vintage photo of Ray Stevens emerged on his social media about half an hour ago and I decided to share it on this blog. There wasn't any information about it...I made the assumption that it might be from the late 1970s. You can clearly see that Military design on the sleeve of the jacket...and from my eyes it appears there's a carnation or some sort of flower on the left side of the jacket. The floor shot angle of the photo gives the appearance of a thin beard...as if he's it's in the process of growing out fuller...so I assume it's from some point in 1978 or 1979...it could even be from some point in the latter half of 1977. There's a period in Ray's career where he stopped appearing clean shaven and I've often pin-pointed this to the year 1978. The earliest photo that I seen Ray with a beard was in the 1960s but it was a photo that wasn't meant for publicity but was more of a personal photo that Ray decided one day to share on his social media. You'd think I'd have that photo in my online collection but I don't. I can't find it on Ray's social media anymore and I saved it on a former computer I was on. I may look in more detail and see if I come across that 1960's photo of Ray with a beard. Anyway...the hairstyle had me thinking 1977/1978/1979 but the thin beard has me thinking late 1977/early 1978. However...Ray also had a beard for a number of years in the early '70s. On his guest appearances on Hee Haw in 1972 and in 1975 he had a beard. The beard was gone when he next appeared on the show in 1976. If that doesn't complicate matters there are photos of Ray from the early 1980s with a thinner beard than usual...but I'll go with my original assumption that the photo originated sometime in the late 1970s. There are a couple of photos from this performance in the Photo section of Ray's Facebook page. Take a look at this one...

As you can see in that awesome photo Ray Stevens is belting out one of his songs...it could be "Everything is Beautiful" or it could be any number of the love ballads he recorded during his years at Warner Brothers in the late 1970s. You can clearly see the flower in that photo which was partially hidden in the photo above. When looking through the various photo's over on Ray's Facebook page I'm reminded of several photos of Ray from this performance that have previously been shared...one photo shared in 2019 shows Ray looking very intense with his head tilted downward looking at the piano. I've posted that photo below to close out the blog entry. When Ray performed his 1979 novelty single, "I Need Your Help, Barry Manilow" he remained seated at the piano for the entire performance. The photo off to the right also had me thinking he may have been singing the chorus of that song when this photo was taken but he's probably in the middle of singing "Everything is Beautiful" as I previously mentioned. If you follow Ray's social media pages then you've seen these photos before...but, like myself, you may forget from time to time if you've seen a photo if it's not a constant presence. Do you have any guesses as to what he might be singing in the photo above? Here's that intense photo of Ray looking at the piano...completely captured by the music.

Ray Stevens audio clip: "Float"...

Well, in this blog entry which happens to be my 240th of the year, I'm embedding a particular recording from Ray Stevens that comes from his 1973 album, Nashville. The recording is an instrumental...it features heavy emphasis on two of the most polar opposite instruments in the music world: the steel guitar and the trumpet! The instrumental is titled "Float" and not only does it feature those two instruments it also incorporates the piano and guitars...but when you listen to it you're going to hear an abundance of the trumpet, the performance's main instrument. Ray wrote and arranged this recording as well as produced it.  

If you follow Ray's career with any degree of an in-depth nature you'll know that he can play the trumpet...he's credited as a trumpet player on some of his recording sessions and he is credited as a timpani player on his 1985 album...notably heard on the chicken clucking fanfare called "Thus Cacked Henrietta". That's the only recording on that album to feature a timpani, by the way. Those thundering beats heard throughout that recording is Ray striking the timpani. You can search YouTube for video of musicians playing a timpani and once you hear those strikes being applied you'll immediately recognize Ray's "Thus Cacked Henrietta", which itself is based on the fanfare portion heard in a classical music piece titled "Also sprach Zarathustra", written by Richard Strauss. When you see a timpani you'll know they're also referred to as kettledrums. 

Now, since Ray can play a trumpet, I've always assumed that he's the one playing the trumpet on the "Float" recording...but I can't definitively answer that, yet. The musicians aren't credited on the back of the 1973 Nashville album and there's no notation anywhere crediting Ray as the trumpet player on that recording. I'm assuming the steel guitar player is Jay Dee Mannes, the same steel guitarist who played on some of Ray's other albums of this time period. Steel guitarist Larry Sasser used to do concert dates with Ray...Larry also doubled as a dobro player if needed. Hal Rugg played the steel guitar on a couple of Ray Stevens recordings as did John Hughey. I've not done hardly any blog entries where I've spotlighted the musicians that have appeared on Ray Stevens albums over the decades...one day I'll get around to writing a blog about the musicians. 

Some of his albums, like 1973's Nashville, doesn't feature a credited musician list so it's anyone's guess who played on what recording. Ray famously likes to keep it simple when it comes to the studio musicians that appear on his albums...some have appeared on his albums for more than 30 years. There was once a time when, in the 1990s, the musicians that appeared on Ray's current albums were the same ones that appeared on his 1970s albums. In an era where there's a lot of turn-over when it comes to studio musicians and road musicians Ray's continually managed to keep a small group of them together for decades at a time (studio musicians and concert musicians) and the same goes for his harmony singers! Now, yes, of course, there's been some turn-over...some musicians may retire or they pass away...or some want to move on and do other things but for the most part the people he surrounds himself with tend to stay with him for decades.  

Ray Stevens: Hee Haw performance of "You've Got the Music Inside"...

Among the several YouTube video clips from Ray Stevens that have arrived over the last several days I'm selecting the 1980 Hee Haw performance of "You've Got the Music Inside". Ray wrote this song and it originally appeared on his 1973 album, Nashville, as a slow ballad. He re-recorded the song in 1978 for his Be Your Own Best Friend album and he gave the song different instrumentation and a slightly different melody...his vocalization had also changed dramatically over the period of time between 1973 and 1978. 

I think his vocals began to shift at some point during the recording of his 1975 Misty album and the release of his 1976 album, Just For the Record. He gave the 1978 recording of "You've Got the Music Inside" a softer vocal delivery. I think he may have deliberately recorded it softer...several other songs on that album carry the soft vocal touch: "With a Smile", "Daydream Romance", and the ultra-soft vocalization heard on "You're Magic". That particular 1978 album had some soft vocalization but it didn't carry over onto his other 1978 album, There Is Something on Your Mind, a very eclectic album where Ray sings his favorite classic rhythm and blues songs. In Ray's television appearances in the late '70s and early '80s, whenever he'd perform "You've Got the Music Inside" it was never like the 1973 or 1978 recordings. In these performances he completely re-arranged the opening to a hand-clapping sing-a-long of the verses and the chorus. Then, as you'll see and hear, he slows down the music to how it sounded on his 1973 recording...and he sings part of the song as a ballad, briefly, before kicking up the tempo once again. He performed this arrangement of the song on an early '80s episode of Pop! Goes the Country and that arrangement accompanies him in this 1980 performance on Hee Haw. The link takes you to a video found on Ray's Facebook video page. The YouTube video I originally pasted in this blog entry became unavailable because the YouTube user's page was removed/deleted. I think I used a couple of other videos of Ray Stevens from Hee Haw from that YouTube channel, too, in some earlier blog entries.

Ray Stevens: 1974 Hit Parader Article...

This must be a relatively new item on eBay as it's only come to my attention within the last several hours. It's a January 1974 issue of a magazine called Hit Parader. The magazine cover's main subject is the southern rock group Black Stone Arkansas. There are advertisements on the magazine's cover for other acts of the time period and there's reference to that issue's collection of lyrics from current songs. It's not entirely accidental that the magazine's cover doesn't promote an article on Ray Stevens. If I were to have seen this magazine advertised on-line and if there wasn't any reference made to an article inside about Ray Stevens I wouldn't have even concerned myself with the contents of that issue. The same could be said if any fan of Ray would have seen this magazine on a retail rack in 1974 and if they didn't bother to browse through it before purchasing they wouldn't have even been aware of the Ray Stevens article because it's not advertised on the magazine cover. I say it was not entirely accidental that his name isn't advertised on the magazine cover due to rock and roll clashing with the 'pop' music preferred by radio programmers and being played on Top-40 radio.

Even though Adult-Contemporary radio stations were around in the early '70s and had begun popping up in the mid '60s when traditional pop music singers had largely been replaced by rock and roll performers there was nevertheless a growing resentment among disc jockeys of 'rock and roll' music having softer pop and rock songs on their playlists. In an interview of Ray that appeared in a July 1970 issue of TV Guide he remarked: "I'm not what you call a country performer. I'm more pop-contemporary"...the very format that rock and roll publications were hesitant to heavily promote.

The advance of time and the creation of the internet has long since resolved this culture clash and everyone is free to listen to whatever style of music they choose at the click of a button in an on-line music store or on YouTube but this luxury obviously didn't exist back in 1974...and so the acts advertised on the magazine's cover, more than likely, reflect the personal taste of the magazine's owner or it's editor. It's highly unlikely Ray Stevens would enter your mind when you look at a magazine cover spotlighting a rowdy looking rock and roll group...but then again the magazine cover makes mention of a device called an Elecphone from Andy and David Williams (the twin nephews of pop crooner Andy Williams) who were as far removed from rock and roll as you could get in 1974 but the twins managed to achieve the teen idol treatment (numerous appearances in magazines catering mostly to teenage girls) but predictably the duo met with resistance from radio programmers. You can see the magazine by clicking this LINK.

1973

The magazine being issued in January 1974 is notable for it being released several months before "The Streak" came along and it's a glimpse into Ray's career time-line months before that particular smash hit would forever become synonymous with career. The current album from Ray at the time of the magazine's release happened to be Nashville. In the magazine you'll see a photo of the Nashville album and you'll see a photo of Ray taken during the photo session for the album. There is a photo of Ray, with a beard, sitting at his piano inside his recording studio. This is very similar to a photo that appears in the liner notes of a 1997 CD on Rhino Records titled The Best of Ray Stevens. In that photo Ray is grinning from ear to ear but in this magazine photo the facial expression is more of a slight smile...but it was definitely taken on the same day in 1973. On the left hand side of the blog entry is a cassette copy of Nashville...something rare...as cassette format was largely overshadowed by vinyl even though existence of cassette tape had been around since the '60s. The music cassette was something of a phenomenon in the 1970s as it enabled people to take their music with them on a portable device as opposed to sitting at home with a vinyl LP of music playing on a turntable. The popularity of the music cassette took off in the late '70s and became the dominant form of music sales in the 1980s even though vinyl continued to be released throughout the decade, too. If you notice there's an MGM logo on the lower right hand side of the cassette. If you know your record label distribution history you're no doubt aware that Barnaby Records went through a series of distributors in America and internationally. The label was distributed by CBS Records in the early part of the '70s and then Janus Records became one of it's distributors. Janus fell under the umbrella of GRT Records. MGM, as you can see, at one time distributed Barnaby Records products. The MGM distribution deal was apparently brief because Ray's earlier LP release in 1973, Losin' Streak, was distributed by CBS Records and his 1974 LP, Boogity Boogity, was distributed by GRT/Janus and in between the release of those two LP's was 1973's Nashville, with MGM distribution.

Ray Stevens: The Elusive Ten...

Hello to all the fans of Ray Stevens! September is here and for those that took advantage of the half-price sale of Ray's Such a Night DVD (sale ended yesterday), good for you. I'm sure it and or other items are going to be on sale in a couple of months as the Christmas season begins but perhaps not at such a steep discount as the one that just ended. By that time could it be possible that the long-awaited Volume 2 of his gospel recordings might be available?

I don't, of course, have any idea about the contracts and other things that go on in Ray's business life but I'd like to hear the remaining songs from those gospel recording sessions...at some point.

The reason I bring it up is because during the publicity and promotion for the Ray Stevens Gospel Collection, Volume One CD Ray often remarked that he'd recorded more than 20 songs and the first 10 appear on the Volume One CD and the other batch of songs are going to appear on Volume Two. The gospel CD hit the market on August 19, 2014 and so, given that it's been more than a year, could it very well be possible that the follow-up is right around the corner?

Getting to the heart of this particular blog entry I'm bringing attention to a series of LP's in the career of Ray Stevens that have, to date, remained exclusive to vinyl, cassette, and 8-track format in an era of CD, digital downloads, and other technological inventions. As a result of the LP's not being available in a contemporary format there's a chance that some of his fans may want to track these albums down on internet auction sites to hear what they've been missing.

There's proof via social network commentary that a lot of Ray's younger and or newest fans discovered his music by accident given the lack of mainstream publicity on radio/television...therefore these newer fans of his are more often than not only familiar with Ray for whatever video clip they discovered on YouTube from him. This fan created blog is designed to spotlight his career, from all time periods, for those that have discovered him on YouTube but may not know much at all about his music.

In keeping with that goal here is a list of 10 studio albums from Ray Stevens that have never been available on CD or Mp3...

1. Have a Little Talk with Myself; 1969 Monument Records-  This is one of Ray's cover albums. In this collection he delivers the hits originally recorded by the likes of The 5th Dimension, Blood, Sweat, and Tears, The Beatles, Bob Dylan...a varied collection of pop music artists and groups. There are three original songs among the covers...first there's "Sunday Mornin' Comin' Down" from the pen of Kris Kristofferson. Ray recorded this song before Johnny Cash...but it's Johnny that ended up having the big hit single on it. Ray's recording afforded him the chance to appear on the Country music singles chart for the first time in his career...both here in America and in Canada. The other original song is "The Little Woman", a tale of fidelity and devotion. The third original song is the album's title track...the inspirational tale of attitude correction and prioritizing one's life. The title track also reached the country singles chart. The cover songs include "Help", "Aquarius", "Hey Jude", "I'll Be Your Baby Tonight", and "Hair" among others. The highlight among those being "Hair"...the production and time put into making the record sound almost exactly like the original by the cast of the musical, Hair, is a testament to his genius in the recording studio. The entire LP is incredible. It's a travesty it's never been issued on CD/Mp3.

2. Losin' Streak; 1973 Barnaby Records- For whatever reason this LP didn't see a re-issue from Collectible's Records even though the company re-issued the other studio albums Ray recorded for Barnaby (1970-1975). It still remains a mystery as to the reason it was skipped over. The title track appeared as a single release but it never charted. One of the tracks, "Inside", found itself as the B-side of several single releases from Ray in this era. There's an instrumental on here called "Laid Back". My favorites are "Golden Age", "This is Your Life", and "Idaho Wine". Physically, this is the first album of his to show him having a beard. Typically clean-shaven for photo sessions the beard didn't become a physical fixture until around 1978 or so. If anybody has a clean-shaven photo of Ray from the 1980s, 1990s, or even this decade I'd love to see it! I doubt any exist.

3. Just For The Record; 1976 Warner Brothers- Ray's debut on a different label after 5 years at Barnaby. The music he recorded on this album, country-pop, fit in nicely among the other songs on country radio and he enjoyed a pair of Top-30 country music hits in the process... "You Are So Beautiful" and "Honky Tonk Waltz". A non-album single, "In the Mood", hit in December of 1976 and it became a novelty hit in the early part of 1977 in America, Canada, and in the United Kingdom. The single, clucked like a choir of chickens and initially released as The Henhouse Five Plus Too, is one of those rare instances of a single hitting the market out of the blue without any advanced publicity to speak of. It never appeared on any LP but the label promoted the single, heavily, to pop music markets and it became an international Top-40 hit. It's long been said by historians that being primarily a West Coast music company, Warner Brothers didn't necessarily know how to market to country music outlets (especially the southern markets in the Eastern portion of the United States). Also, the label hadn't been in the business of marketing music for too long. Legendary country music artist Buck Owens, also signed to the label around the same time, seen a dramatic drop in his album sales, too, compared to his previous albums for Capitol. In fact, Buck's first 2 studio albums for Warner Brothers never even appeared on the sales charts. Ironically, this Ray Stevens album happened to be a success, however...

4. Feel the Music; 1977 Warner Brothers- For this album Ray penned 9 of the 10 songs! He also, as usual, produced and arranged the music from his own recording studio and contributed his musical prowess on keyboards/piano. Unfortunately the extreme lack of publicity for the LP caused it to literally anchor the Top-50 album chart during an all too brief visit. The label's continued publicity for "In the Mood" may have also hurt this album's potential (commercially speaking, of course). The number of positions on the Country album chart at the time happened to be 50. Even though, by comparison, one of the single releases from the LP titled "Dixie Hummingbird", managed to peak just outside the radio-oriented Top-40 portion of the Country singles chart; however, the funky audio sound effects in "Get Crazy With Me" and it being marketed to country music outlets as it was, well, obviously, the song seen resistance from programmers unwilling to add it. One gets the sense that there wasn't any clear direction, from a label stand-point, as to which way to market his music. He remained just as popular as ever on tour but clearly the label's inability to market/promote his records properly certainly must have caused strained relations...

5. There Is Something On Your Mind; 1978 Warner Brothers- This is a covers album featuring Ray paying tribute to classic rhythm and blues artists and groups. The album is one of his most personal given that he supplied his own liner notes (a rarity) and discussed, song by song, his thoughts and opinions about each of the songs and how he became familiar with them during his child-hood/teenage years. It's a marvelous collection but it never reached the album charts and no song became a single release...almost as if it's a ghost album that existed at one time but yet there's no trace of it's existence in music trade publications. I've yet to come across any article in Billboard from 1978 (via Google archive research) to mention the LP in any write-up or any promo ad from Warner Brothers. If anybody has any publicity about the LP let me know! I've got the LP in my collection but as a fan I like seeing advertisements/publicity for Ray's music at the time it originally surfaced.

6. Be Your Own Best Friend; 1978 Warner Brothers- This is the fourth and final studio album Ray recorded for the label. Surprisingly the album received publicity in a more traditional sense by appearing in a large print ad in Billboard. The album never reached the charts but the title track became a Top-40 country music hit in America and a Top-20 country music hit in Canada. In Canada it happened to be a fairly decent hit...peaking in the Top-20 on October 14, 1978 (after leaping from the lower half of the Top-40 a week earlier). It can be said that the single peaked too soon because, for a Top-20 hit single, it was only among the Top-20 for one week before falling back into the upper Top-30. One also could say the single either had massive sales spikes or enormous airplay during an 8 week period (September 9, 1978-October 28, 1978).

1979's release, The Feeling's Not Right Again, is a compilation album consisting of 9 songs taken from Ray's previous LP's for Warner Brothers and one brand new song, the satirical "I Need Your Help, Barry Manilow". That particular single, chart-wise, is his biggest single release for the label. It charted country (ironically enough) and it peaked in the Top-50 on the Hot 100 pop chart but more ironically is it's performance on Adult-Contemporary/Easy-Listening radio (the format ruled largely by Barry Manilow during the latter half of the 1970s). The single peaked just outside the Top-10 on Billboard's Adult-Contemporary chart. The single reinforced his reputation as a novelty artist, though. His biggest selling hits for the label happened to be this and 1977's "In the Mood". Not long after the success of "I Need Your Help, Barry Manilow" Ray quietly left Warner Brothers and joined the roster of RCA Records. His move to RCA took place in the latter half of 1979...and publicity surrounding his arrival appeared in Billboard that same year. The blurb mentioned that he'd soon be in the studio to start working on his debut for the label.

7.  Shriner's Convention; 1980 RCA- This is Ray's debut album for the RCA label and it's an all-comedy project. It marked the first all-comedy album from Ray in 6 years (his previous being the 1974 album spotlighting "The Streak"). This album also reached the Top-10 on the Country album chart...a major success in both sales and publicity. It's big hit, "Shriner's Convention", also became a Top-10 hit on the country music singles chart. The album contained another single release, "Hey There", but it never charted. The title track and "The Dooright Family" have consistently appeared on numerous compilation albums released by RCA and their family of labels.

8. One More Last Chance; 1981 RCA- Like the other LP's this one is also unavailable on CD and Mp3. This collection of songs are meant to compliment the Urban Cowboy craze that had been sweeping the nation for the last couple of years. Even though Ray's previous LP happened to be a Top-10, all-comedy smash hit he immediately began to work on this album. In fact, during a couple of print interviews that surfaced in newspapers at the time of the album and single's success, Ray defiantly took the stance of distancing himself from comedy as soon as possible so he could get back to serious recordings once more. The album's first single, "Night Games", appeared in the latter half of 1980 and it climbed into the Top-20 on the country singles chart in America...but at the time there happened to be no LP in the stores featuring the single and so it remained a single-only release until this album appeared in 1981. In a show of the times Ray is decked out in western attire and on the back of the album he's wearing a cowboy hat. "Night Games" did even better in Canada...peaking 9 positions higher than it's peak position in America. The album's title track reached the country singles Top-40.

9. Don't Laugh Now; 1982 RCA- Ray's third studio album for the label carries a bit more Rhythm and Blues and pop-country than the previous collection as the opening track, "Such a Night", clearly demonstrates. This album didn't reach the charts (neither did the 1981 LP) but it contained a Top-40 country hit in "Written Down in My Heart" and a gospel-tinged novelty single titled "Where The Sun Don't Shine", which also reached the country chart. In contrast to the 1981 LP, this one carried a much more uptempo feel and an optimistic one. Most of the songs on the 1981 LP happened to be ballads and the feel of the collection had an overall melancholy flavor in spite of several rousing uptempo songs. For the 1982 LP there's the fair share of ballads but not all of them are slow ballads...a couple of them are mid-tempo, actually, such as "Country Boy, Country Club Girl" and "Oh Leo Lady" and then there's "Why Don't We Go Somewhere and Make Love". Even though it's a romantic ballad the chorus picks the song up delivering an easy-listening sing-a-long. The only slow ballad is "This Old Piano"...in close second is the title track.

10. Me; 1983 Mercury-  Lastly there's this 1983 studio album on Mercury Records...the label that made Ray Stevens a recording star in the early '60s. This time around Ray delivered an album of songs mostly self-written but like his last 2 studio albums for RCA this one didn't make the charts, either. It did contain one single that reached the country charts...the majestic "My Dad", from the pen of Dale Gonyea (the one that wrote "I Need Your Help, Barry Manilow"). The LP didn't receive much publicity and beyond the brief chart run of "My Dad" it didn't get much notice except for an extremely rare promo by Ray Stevens on an episode of The Fall Guy titled 'The Pirates of Nashville'. In that episode Ray plays a character named Covington, a country music artist estranged from his son. There's a performance of one of the songs from the album at the end of the episode but there's no mention of the album's existence or anything. The album hit in the last half of 1983 and the single releases didn't arrive until 1984. "My Dad", "Love Will Beat Your Brains Out", "Mary Lou Nights", "Game Show Love", "Me", and "A Piece of Paradise Called Tennessee" appeared on single releases from Mercury throughout the first half of 1984. Once his contract expired Ray set his attention on MCA Records and an incredible run of commercially successful albums and singles soon followed.

And there you have it! Those 10 studio albums have never seen a re-issue of any kind on CD or Mp3. Some may say it has to do with the lack of major hit recordings contained on those albums....some may say the albums themselves aren't worthy of re-issue...and some may say the albums had no commercial value then so why would there be any audience all these years later. I think there's an audience...a built-in audience of fans that are familiar with his songs but hadn't actually heard the various styles of music those albums represent because the complete studio albums are hard to come by and if found can only be heard on vinyl or cassette tape.