Ray Stevens: 1980 with Ralph Emery...

Hello once again all you fans of Ray Stevens!! I was thinking long and hard of what to title this blog entry because in the past I've used a lot of references to the syndicated country music series, Pop! Goes the Country, given that Ray made frequent appearances on the show. The series was hosted by Ralph Emery for nearly 6 full seasons (1974-1980) and then by Tom T. Hall during the final three (1980-1983). This video clip I'm sharing would be from the last series of episodes that Ralph hosted in 1980. From this series Ralph would go on to host a short-lived national series on TBS, Nashville Alive. That series wrapped up in 1982 and then, within a year, he was hosting Nashville Now on The Nashville Network beginning in March 1983 and that lasted a full decade. In this video clip Ray and Ralph discuss the business of making records. Ralph brings up that Ray once produced records on Dolly Parton. Ray tells of how Dolly was recording for Monument Records at the time and that he wanted to promote her as a pop artist. Ray worked behind the scenes while at Monument Records in addition to being a recording artist. 

In addition being a singer, songwriter, record producer, musician, and music arranger Ray Stevens often worked in what's known in the music industry as A and R. 

Ray looked around for songs and listened to demo's of songs...my guess is he'd submit his findings to whatever record producer or record executive that had the final say. Although he doesn't directly say it in the video Ray kind of alludes to that the only downside to being in the A and R department is if the recording artist wants to do their own songs. If a singer happens to be a songwriter or, more often than not, insists on recording their own songs, there usually isn't much compromise and the work of the person tasked to find songs falls by the wayside. But nevertheless Ray talks about being the record producer of several early Dolly recordings...including "Happy, Happy Birthday Baby". Later in the video clip Ray performs an abbreviated "Save Me From Myself", a song from his 1977 album, Feel the Music. He sings the first verse and the chorus. I wish the entire song would've been performed, though, but it's still fun to watch and hear him talk and sing!! It was the birthdate of the late Ralph Emery several days ago and this video clip appeared on Ray's various social media page. 

Ray Stevens: Vintage YouTube Uploads...

Ralph Emery and Ray Stevens, 1979

Hello once more! There have been a couple of vintage video clips uploaded onto YouTube since my last blog entry and I'm embedding both of them below. The first clip is a full length episode of the television series, Pop! Goes the Country, from 1979. Well, I should say that it was taped in 1979 but it aired early in 1980. Ralph Emery hosted this series for it's first six and a half seasons beginning in 1974. In the episode Ray opens the show with his rendition of "You Are So Beautiful", a Top-20 country hit for him in 1976. After a brief interview with Ralph the next performance is an abbreviated "Save Me From Myself", an inspirational song Ray wrote for his 1977 album, Feel the Music. The other special guest is a singer that went by one name, Dottsy. She sings a couple of songs on this episode and is interviewed, too. Ray speaks about his recent sleepless night in a hotel during a Shriner's convention and this leads into a performance of "Shriner's Convention". There are several internet sites that state this episode was broadcast in February of 1980 and it's always been my assumption that the episode had to have been taped in the latter half of 1979 in order for it be ready for air by February 1980. I've always wanted to know the exact month/year this episode was taped because, as a detailed fan of Ray's, I'd like to know if this was Ray's first on-air performance of the song. He performed the song in a 1979 made for TV movie called Concrete Cowboys, too, and so I've never really discovered which performance came first...the made for TV movie or the episode of Pop! Goes the Country. I'd uploaded a performance of "Shriner's Convention" from this episode many blog entries ago but this is the full-length episode.



In this next video clip it's a 1985 interview on a local show titled Talk of the Town. Ray was newly signed to MCA Records and in the very early stages of the reshaping of his career as a country comedian given the comedy songs are what the public at large recognizes him for. He explains in the interview that he'd started out singing love ballads and songs aimed at teenagers but when he issued a single called "Sgt. Preston of the Yukon", a novelty, it gained a lot of attention and he feels it would've been his breakthrough hit had the copyright owners of the Sgt. Preston character not threatened a lawsuit. He then explained that his next release should be a comedy recording and so in 1961 along came "Jeremiah Peabody's Green and Purple Pills" and then in 1962 "Ahab the Arab" became the breakthrough hit he'd been waiting for and it set the stage for the career he's still enjoying.

Elsewhere in the interview he speaks of Buddy Kalb and how "Mississippi Squirrel Revival" wasn't the first choice for a single release but there was a demand for that particular song when disc jockeys started playing it, on their own, rather than playing the song that was being pushed as the album's first single...a practice referred to as unsolicited airplay. The interview takes place during the early phases of the squirrel's release as a single. The single made it's debut on the Billboard Country chart on December 8, 1984. How ironic that it makes it's chart debut six days after my birthday. I was born on December 2...so this single hit the chart six days after I turned 8 years old...and how ironic it is that it's the first song by Ray Stevens that I heard several years later as a pre-teen in a pizza place on a jukebox. But anyway...the single hit the country chart in December 1984 and it rose from it's number 76 debut to number 49 in three weeks time...and smashed it's way into the Top-40 during January 1985. In the meantime his debut album for MCA, which contained the squirrel song, hit the Country album chart in late December 1984.



The two of these vintage video clips are fascinating to watch. If you weren't even born yet when these interviews and performances from Ray Stevens took place then you're seeing something brand new. If you were born but were still a kid at the time (like myself) or hadn't migrated over to country music and re-discovered Ray Stevens all over again then these interviews and performances will be new to you as well. There's always been a lot of things written about Ray Stevens over the decades but it's always great to hear the legendary entertainer in his own words.