Ray Stevens: The Road to the Country Music Hall of Fame, Part Twenty-Five...

Hello all...we're still in 2010 as I begin this installment of the mini-blog series. This was a year filled with so much activity it's near impossible to recount everything that was happening as Ray's political comedy videos were taking him all over the place. On tax day as it's called (April 15th) he appeared at a large Tea Party event organized by Freedomworks. The event lasted all day but Ray was part of the evening line-up and performed "If Ten Percent is Good Enough for Jesus". This particular song received new life, as the saying goes, during this political era of his music career. The song had previously been recorded by Ray nearly 20 years earlier in 1993...and it was a fan favorite then but in 2010 it took on whole new life thanks to it's exposure at Tea Party events such as the one Freedomworks organized in 2010. The song was part of the 22 track We The People album released that year. It reached the Billboard Country Album chart...his first album to appear on this chart since 2002's Osama Yo' Mama. The album also appeared on the Billboard Top Comedy Album chart...a secondary chart that, as you could imagine, ranks comical releases. It hit the Top-5 on this chart. The driving force behind the successful YouTube music videos were the public, in general, viewing them and sharing them on social media sites. A unique view is best described as the first viewing of a video from a computer, smart phone, or any other kind of on-line device. The tracking used to total the number of unique views for a YouTube video doesn't count additional views from the same device. The reason for that is obvious...multiple plays from the same on-line device would no doubt skew the numbers...and so the policy of counting one view per device keeps things on the level and doesn't allow for artificial view counts.

The music video that broke through and pushed Ray's visibility into the on-line stratosphere (if there's even such a place) is "Come to the U.S.A.". On the surface the song may cause a listener to think that Ray is inviting an onslaught of illegal immigrants to set their sights on the United States but in truth the song uses sarcasm and points out how illegal immigration is dealt with in other countries whereas the United States Federal Government more or less knows about the situation but often turns their collective eye away. A lot of the reason is for labor reasons. Cheap labor...performing jobs that the average U.S. citizen wouldn't do for minimum wage or less...can be given to desperate illegal immigrants. It's exploitation, of course, but there's so many other things tied into it that it would take more blog entries to explain it all. If you're wanting a more detailed look at this music video and the subject matter visit the archives of this blog...go to the year 2010 and look for blog entries focused on "Come to the U.S.A." and you'll get my commentary and information from that time period. The video itself has obtained more than 10,000,000 unique views since it debuted on YouTube back in May of 2010. Along the same lines of cheap labor...but this time around focusing on America's jobs being sent to Mexico...is "Sucking Sound". This song had previously appeared on the non-political Hurricane CD but it's an example of one of those songs from Ray that, from time to time, takes on a topical subject matter and placed on a collection of lighthearted comedy songs. Ray does his vocal impression of Ross Perot in this recording...a song that he co-wrote with Buddy Kalb...and it's a perfect fit on the 2010 We The People album. Some of the songs on that album originally appeared on the Thank You album from the early 2000s: "Let's Roll", "Stand Up", and of course "Thank You".

Since we're in a topical vein and Ray's career had taken a political/topical/patriotic turn do you all remember the lawsuit filed against the Arizona State Government by the Federal Government? This surreal event in U.S. History began brewing in the latter half of 2009 and it reached a boiling point in 2010. The Governor of Arizona, Jan Brewer, and several local police officers were stopping suspected illegals at the Arizona border. The Obama Administration stepped in and the Attorney General at the time, Eric Holder, filed lawsuits preventing the Arizona State Government from enforcing existing immigration laws. This entire controversy turned up in a very serious recording from Ray titled "God Save Arizona" which he co-wrote with Buddy Kalb. The music video, believe it or not, created some controversy with YouTube. It was uploaded in August of 2010 but was taken down without warning several days after it made it's debut...but it eventually returned to the video hosting site and has remained on-line ever since. If I recall correctly the video had fell victim to a lot of troll-induced flagging from those that didn't like the opinions expressed in the song and, as a precaution, YouTube took the video down for their own 'investigation' and they felt that it didn't violate any of their 'rules' and it returned to the video hosting site. The video, like all of Ray's previous politically themed videos, was an immediate social-media hit and in September the video was given exposure on an episode of Bill O'Reilly's television series on Fox News Channel.

In the winter of 2010 publicity eventually surfaced surrounding Ray's Christmas CD from 2009. The project had gotten overlooked due to the enormous launch of "We The People" on the internet and everything else that came along in 2010. The holiday album, as mentioned in my previous blog entry, features serious Christmas songs...most of them done with new arrangements...while some remain faithful to the traditional arrangements. In this collection you'll get Ray's versions of "Let It Snow, Let It Snow, Let It Snow", "Jingle Bells", "Winter Wonderland", an original titled "Deck The Halls with Teardrops", plus his take on "Have Yourself a Merry Little Christmas" plus more. In November 2010 onto YouTube arrived the music video of "Nightmare Before Christmas" from his comical Christmas album thirteen years earlier.

The political overtones in his career remained intact in 2011 as he was one of the guests at CPAC in February. The acronym stands for Conservative Political Action Conference. He performed a couple of songs during his CPAC segment: "Mr. President, Mr. President" and "The Skies Just Ain't Friendly Anymore". The latter deals with the security measures in place from the TSA while the former features Ray as a reporter asking Obama a series of questions with predictably humorous answers. A couple of months later a brand new video emerged, "Obama Budget Plan", in April. This song/video was centered around the Federal Government's spending habits...debt and deficit were some of the topics headlining nationally and this song told the story of a married couple that decide to print their own money, spend more and more, but have no care or concern because they can simply print more money just like the Federal Government does. The video has a twist ending...visually...evoking sentiments that I'm sure are held by many when it comes to their wishes for many members of Congress.

2011

The music video for "Mr. President, Mr. President", the song he debuted at his CPAC appearance in February, hit YouTube in September 2011. The music video uses images of Obama during a press conference, making it appear as if he's listening to the questions being asked by Ray, whose dressed in traditional newspaper journalist attire...with pen in hand...it's a very funny song and video but the critics were plenty. Some criticized the old-fashioned look of how Ray portrayed the reporter...taking swipes at Ray for not being 'current' and having the reporter wireless or sporting some sort of technological device...rather than appearing as if he's from the 1940s or 1950s. The politically charged critics, of course, criticized the song simply on the grounds of it putting Obama in a humorous light. This run of political and topical music videos ultimately led to the release of Spirit of '76, an 11 track album, which features the audio recordings of several songs previously released in music video format on YouTube: "God Save Arizona", "The Skies Just Ain't Friendly Anymore", "Obama Budget Plan", and a couple of songs that would eventually become music videos after the release of the CD: "Mr. President, Mr. President" and more than a year later, "Grandpa Voted Democrat". There are several other songs on the 2011 album that I thought would have been perfect for music video adaptation: "Cap'n Trade the Pirate" is hysterical and it could have easily played into the imagery depicted in the music video for "The Pirate Song" more than a decade earlier. I always envisioned "New Normal" as a music video presented on intentionally grainy film and given a classic country music 'look'...the way Ray sings the title phrase had me thinking of Hank Williams and in my mind I invented a possible direction of staging a music video and have it look as if it's from the 1950s. The We The People album from 2010 featured a couple of songs that I think could have been turned into funny music videos but weren't: "Solar Powered Song" and "We Are the Government".

Clyde Records, in November 2011, issued the DVD collection Internet Video Hits. This release was designed to provide a collection for the music videos that Ray had issued on the internet over the last year and a half. Ray, when speaking of the release, mentioned that it's been issued mainly for those that are older and perhaps do not have any interest of being on the internet but are fans of his nevertheless...and so this DVD would provide the non-internet fan base the chance of seeing the on-line music videos in one collection. The DVD seen a wider release in February of 2012. The DVD features 9 political music videos with a bonus music video dealing with political correctness, "The Nightmare Before Christmas", added to round out the total.

Throughout most of Ray's television appearances on cable news programs and on talk-radio in the aftermath of "We The People" he often mentioned a project he was working on in which he would pay tribute to novelty songs of all time periods and music formats. The project surfaced in February of 2012 as The Encyclopedia of Recorded Comedy Music. The project took two years, according to Ray's interviews as well as the on-line YouTube advertisements, and it's a massive collection of songs. It's a 9-CD box set complete with an extensive booklet with liner notes, commentary, and stories behind the songs Ray chose to record for the collection. When the project was still in production there were some fans that thought Ray would be presenting a collection of novelty songs recorded by other artists...they didn't realize that Ray himself would be performing the songs. So, in this 9-CD collection, we have Ray's versions of novelty classics such as "Does Your Chewing Gum Lose it's Flavor on the Bedpost Overnight?", "Little Brown Jug", "Itsy Bitsy Teenie Weenie Yellow Polka Dot Bikini", "Three Little Fishes", "Open the Door, Richard", "Mairzy Doats", "Haunted House", "Poison Ivy", "Chug-a-Lug", and dozens of others. Ray actively promoted the 9-CD project and performed songs from the collection on several television programs. The collection featured songs from his own career, too, given that Ray is one of the legendary performers of novelty/comedy songs. Ray's cover of a Toby Keith single, "I Wanna Talk About Me", is on this 9-CD collection. Ray remarked that it comes across as a novelty song to him and so he decided to do his version of the song for this collection.

In the midst of the publicity for the 9-CD box set, though, came a book from Ray titled Let's Get Political. The book features lyrics for the songs found in We The People and Spirit of '76 as well as his remarks and opinions of all the songs and his thoughts surrounding topical issues of the day. It was sold through his website's store. It's a soft-cover book and in digest form...meaning that it's comparable in size to an issue of Farmer's Almanac, for example. In July 2012 a music video for "Obama Nation", a song from Ray's 2010 We The People album, hit YouTube.

In November 2012 "Grandpa Voted Democrat" from 2011's Spirit of '76 hit YouTube. The song deals with voter fraud...a very real concern in any election but it was one of the headlining concerns of the American voting process in a series of recent election cycles both local and national. Now, as history shows, Obama won re-election in November 2012 but the Republicans gained even more control in Congress and the Senate...it built on that party's momentum from 2010.

In my previous installment I made mention of the six week run of concerts Ray performed at The Welk Resort in Branson, Missouri during the fall months of 2010 at the peak of his involvement with political humor. The concerts were split in two segments: The first segment was his traditional concert performance featuring his classic hits like "The Streak", "It's Me Again, Margaret", "Gitarzan", and others while the second segment was political. Some of his performances at this run of concerts eventually found their way onto DVD. Ray issued Such a Night: 50 Years of Hits and Hilarity on Stage...LIVE! as well as a secondary DVD called Patriots and Politics. The DVDs were released on Clyde Records in 2012 but the concert footage was taped in October 2010. I had never seen Ray perform any of the politically themed songs in concert and so the secondary DVD was my chance of seeing him perform "We The People" and "Come to the U.S.A." in a concert setting. I had seen him perform "Safe at Home", though, and "Thank You", in concert. The former is actually nostalgia-laced without a trace of politics at all but it speaks to America's core values and therefore it's categorized as a patriotic song. It had actually originated in 2000 on a studio album Ray issued that year called Ear Candy...but it had long since become part of his concert set-list and ever since 2010 it's been something of a mainstay in his concert performances given the response from the audiences. Ray closed out 2012 in a festive mood...releasing several Christmas music videos on YouTube. "White Christmas" is performed much in the same manner as The Drifters, one of Ray's favorite Rhythm and Blues groups. "Redneck Christmas", at long last, is presented in music video form...even though it's lyrics paint a clear picture already it's fun to actually see a music video of that particular song brought to life. "Blue Christmas" is performed as Porky Pig...which is based on a novelty song from a number of years earlier from a fictional group called Seymour Swine and the Squealers. Ray performs most of the song in a stuttering, stammering fashion before concluding the song straight. The song was issued as a single in 2012 as it's not part of his 1997 or 2009 Christmas albums but it was also made into a music video. A social commentary release titled "Merry Christmas" hit YouTube in December 2012 as well. This, from the pen of Ray Stevens, takes on the politically correct advocates head on and their War on Christmas. Ray proudly voices his right to say 'Merry Christmas' rather than Happy Holidays or Season's Greetings. This was the fourth Christmas music video in the bonanza of music videos that Ray issued in December of 2012 and it was the most somber of the bunch...which goes without saying.

Now, let's see...2010, 2011, and 2012...my oh my how hectic and full of surprises those years provided for Ray Stevens on his road to the Country Music Hall of Fame. In a career laced with unpredictability those three years were about as unpredictable as you could get...his career was as eclectic as ever...being stretched in many different directions and having his hands in several more projects yet to see release as 2012 came to a close. In my next installment I'll take a look at 2013 and 2014...maybe also part of 2015. Ray's main focal point in this era, post-political humor, was a return to more conventional, traditional forms of music expression...but he didn't completely silence himself on matters of politics though...and he issued a much anticipated (from this fan's point of view) career look-back in print form...not necessarily an autobiography...more of a memoir...and more about that in my next installment in Ray Stevens road to the Country Music Hall of Fame!

Ray Stevens and the TSA, Part 2...

As Ray Stevens' new TSA single becomes more and more publicized I'll be writing frequent blogs about it's impact with those who have heard it. Today "The Skies Just Ain't Friendly Anymore" became available as an Mp3 digital single. Previously, on Tuesday, it was only available as a hard-copy/physical CD. For those unaware of the phrases "physical CD" or "hard-copy CD" that you'll see me use it basically means a CD that a person can literally hold in their hands. In the digital age you can't really say the phrase "the latest single" because some will automatically think something's available in Mp3 form and go searching for it whereas in this case a physical CD single and now a digital Mp3 single are available.

So far the song is hitting a positive response from those who've heard it. It's wonderful to see messages/comments from those who get the point of the song and laugh along with it. However, earlier this morning I came across a web-site where the usual contemptuous crowd gather to spew their hatred and, or, collectively look down their noses at "novelty songs". In some of their remarks it was plain to see that the point of the song went over people's heads. One comment suggested that Ray was criticizing a political party (Democrats) even though it was a Republican administration in power when the TSA came into existence. The person making that comment, and others making comments in the same style, completely misunderstood the song or flat out didn't want to understand the song.

The TSA was created in the aftermath of 9/11 for obvious reasons. The song isn't criticizing or spoofing the TSA's original intentions and it isn't criticizing the TSA for it's main function neither. The song, and I feel silly having to explain it because it's message is so crystal clear, the song is about the extreme nature of the TSA's current security policies in airports all over the country. It's amazing how a song can be so crystal clear in it's message but yet without fail there are people who don't want to hear that message or don't have the capability of hearing that message.

Within the song, well more precisely toward the end of the song, Ray singles out the faces of the national Democrat party in Washington, D.C. and those faces are: Obama, Hillary, Nancy, and Harry. Some ask why the song would include those names and, again, it's quite obvious why: When asked about the TSA's security methods each one of them publicly supported what's happening at the airports. So, when you have the leaders of the Democratic party siding with an embarrassing and invasive security policy from the TSA it wouldn't make any comical sense to single out whatever obscure Republican figures there may be who side with the TSA, too. The fact is a majority of Democrats haven't criticized the TSA and instead they come off as supporters of the embarrassing security policies whereas a majority of Republicans have criticized the TSA. That is why the faces of the Democrat party are singled-out in this recording. It shouldn't take a brain surgeon to understand any of this.

Lastly, Ray Stevens will be appearing at CPAC 2011 tomorrow evening. Ray is scheduled to do a show starting at 7:30pm in Washington, D.C.

We're With You, Ray Stevens!

A non-comical recording from Ray Stevens dated 1974 is "You've Got the Music Inside". This is the B-side of "The Streak" but "You've Got the Music Inside" is taken from his 1973 Nashville album. The B-side is not your typical love song...in this song Ray uses the word 'music' as a romantic metaphor when attempting to convey a message to a woman that it isn't right to feel uptight and keep things bottled up about a past relationship when she should be concentrating on the new relationship ahead. Part of the song's chorus suggests that the woman should let go of all of her hang-up's and start all over. This love ballad is well over 4 minutes in length. 4 minutes, 44 seconds to be exact. It's a slow tempo ballad...there's no mid-tempo fast paced rhythm to it except toward the end of the song when the music picks up and Ray gets into the spirit of the situation and vocally lets loose. Ray would later re-record this song in 1978 and place it on his Be Your Own Best Friend album. The 1978 re-recording is not as slow paced as the 1973 recording but the 1978 re-recording features an updated musical arrangement with a deliberate smooth-sounding Adult-Contemporary feel and it retains the slow tempo feel...but it's mid-tempo compared to the 1973 original. Ironically, though, Ray would perform this song on a 1981 episode of Pop! Goes the Country and sing it as an up-tempo party song throughout much of the performance...slowing things down at certain parts of the song...but the party atmosphere remained dominant in that particular television performance. This particular episode was taped after Tom T. Hall took over hosting duties from Ralph Emery and it can be found on DVD at the Classic Country DVD link. It's on the Pop! Goes the Country, Volume 17 edition. Ray and Tom, by the way, sing a duet toward the end of the show...their take on "It's Hard To Be Humble".

"The Streak", the A-side of "You've Got the Music Inside", cemented Ray's reputation as a comical singer...some had always viewed Ray as a comical artist, first and foremost, even before this song was released...but, this particular single forever shaped that belief in the minds of music buyers and radio DJ's. In spite of issuing an abundance of non-comical songs during the latter half of 1974 through 1979 it was the comical recordings that had popped up infrequently during that same time period that became more widely known. Wonderful non-comical songs such as his versions of "Indian Love Call", "Mockingbird Hill", and "You Are So Beautiful" in addition to original material like "Honky Tonk Waltz", "Dixie Hummingbird", "Feel the Music", and "Be Your Own Best Friend" were all greeted with lukewarm reception by DJ's and as a consequence the material wasn't widely played on the radio and as a consequence the lack of widespread airplay didn't enable the music to find a potentially appreciative audience...and without an audience to buy the music it causes an artist to look commercially unpopular. What I just described explains perfectly why airplay and sales pretty much back then went hand in hand...you couldn't have one without the other. Today, though, Ray uses TV advertising, TV appearances, and more frequently, the video hosting web-site, You Tube, to promote his music...and speaking of modern-day Ray Stevens...

Ray Stevens will appear at the CPAC gathering on February 10, 2011. He is scheduled to be a performer...I'm sure he'll speak during his spot on the show but because he's not considered one of the speakers at the event his name doesn't appear among the guests listed on the CPAC web-page. Instead, you'll need to click this link. It's an Adobe Reader/PDF file and once it opens it lists an event by event breakdown of what all will take place. For those who may have trouble opening up that link, Ray's confirmed to appear during the Presidential Banquet portion of CPAC held in the Marriott Ballroom beginning at 7:30pm February 10th. Ray mentioned this upcoming appearance via Twitter, the social network site. The CPAC gathering will be in Washington, D.C. and this marks another occasion where Ray lends his talents to a political event. On April 15, 2010 Ray appeared at a Freedom Works event billed as a Tea Party Tax Day Rally. Ray appeared at other Tea Party events throughout 2010, both on a large and small scale...including an event in Branson, Missouri on the same day that his concert series at The Welk Theater was coming to a close. Ray's most recent You Tube upload is the seasonal "Nightmare Before Christmas" but his most recent political/topical music video was the August 4, 2010 release of "God Save Arizona". This particular music video has gotten 614,245 hits as of 1/21/2011.