Ray Stevens: Here We Go Again!...February Sale of the Month...

Hello one and all...for the month of February the Ray Stevens web-store is offering his 2015 CD, Here We Go Again!, at a discount price. If you frequent his on-line store you should be familiar with the month long discounts/deals placed on random items. This particular deal of the month is a discounted sales price for 2015's Here We Go Again!. If you search my archives that year you'll see that I wrote a lot of blog entries surrounding lead-up to the upcoming release, the release itself, and the music contained on the album I wrote in the form of a review. The main song that emerged from the CD was "Taylor Swift is Stalking Me" which appeared as a music video on YouTube prior to the release of the CD. That video eventually racked up millions of unique views throughout 2015 and the following years. Ray performed several songs from the CD on his CabaRay Nashville television program, including the one referring to Taylor Swift. On an episode of his television show that aired last night on a local PBS station he performed "Walkin' the Dog", a song from this 2015 CD. There are episodes of his show where he also performed "Pickin' on the Chicken", "Little By Little", and "There Must Be a Pill For This".



If you don't yet have a CD copy of this don't miss your chance at purchasing it for the discounted price. As you see on the video screen there is no shipping and handling fee. If you already have a digital Mp3 of this album why not get the CD counterpart. I love having CD copies because of the art work, the information, and sometimes you'll receive on a CD some sort of exclusive content by way of images or even liner notes that aren't reprinted a CD's product page in an on-line music store. This particular CD features a fold-out booklet containing the lyrics of every song, who wrote them, and the music publisher credits. There's also a message from Ray in the fold-out booklet. So while it might make sense to purchase music as Mp3's instead of purchasing a physical CD of music, chances are you're missing out on some of the perks of having an actual CD instead of just having digitally transmitted audio tracks from an on-line store to your on-line device.

Ray Stevens: CD at Five...

March 2015

Hello all fans of Ray Stevens!! It's the start of a new week and as you all should know we'll close out this week celebrating the birthday of the one and only Ray Stevens on January 24th. I don't want to post too much about that today due to my desire to save my commentary for this coming Friday and so I'll get to the topic of this blog entry...the fifth anniversary of Here We Go Again!. I'm a couple months early (the CD was released March 23, 2015) but I decided to go ahead and spotlight the anniversary of it's release now so that it doesn't interfere with blog entries I'll be writing that month surrounding the third season of his CabaRay showroom getting underway the same month. Who knows? Perhaps by the time we reach March there will have been a new Ray Stevens CD hit the market or at least a new on-line music video? I sound like a broken record, of course, but I am anxious to hear whatever new recordings are forthcoming from recently inducted Country Music Hall of Fame member, Ray Stevens. When this CD was issued in the spring of 2015 the music video, "Taylor Swift is Stalking Me", had already taken off on social media. The video was released on February 24, 2015 a month and one day ahead of the CD. The video had gotten nearly half a million unique views on YouTube by the time the CD became available. As of this writing the unique view total is 2.5 million. The specifics in numbers are 2,543,458. 



I wrote a review of the CD on this fan created blog page as well as on Amazon. Now, according to the product details over on AMAZON, there are 14 copies of the CD left in stock. You can also purchase a CD copy from Ray's on-line web-store, of course. I was reading my review prior to composing this blog entry and I noticed there are a couple of typo's as well as a sentence where I left out some words. I don't know if other people deal with this but a lot of time I find myself typing words that I'm saying to myself and in my mind I think I've typed them but sometimes when I go and re-read what I've written I'll notice a word or two had been left out. I don't know if it's a case of the mind being quicker than the hands or not. I'm going to paste my 2015 review below with the corrected typo's and odd sentence. I'm not going to edit the review over on Amazon, though, but I've copied and pasted my review below with the corrections...

***This review contains spoilers***

After taking a detour, of sorts, over the last 5+ years and releasing some hilarious political songs on a couple of CD's, plus issuing a 9-CD box set called "The Encyclopedia of Recorded Comedy Music" (containing his versions of novelty songs of the last 50+ years), a majestic gospel CD last year called "Gospel Collection, Volume One", and a memoir titled "Ray Stevens' Nashville"...after those projects, Ray Stevens returns to country comedy on his latest CD.

The cover art, as you can see, takes place in an airport setting. In a touch of silliness, a gorilla plays the part of the chauffeur. On the back of the CD the songs are listed as if they're flights posted on the Arrival board. The CD's first single release arrived in music video form a month ago...titled "Taylor Swift is Stalkin' Me" it's a story of a man that's obsessed with the belief that he's being stalked by the pop-country singer because, according to him, he sees her everywhere and given that her likeness appears everywhere he happens to think she's stalking him. The song has a comical twist ending, though. Throughout the song he insists that Taylor's up in a tree looking at him with binoculars.

After the bouncy opening track about Taylor we're treated to Ray covering one of his musical idols, Ray Charles. I pretty much know that the purists that'll hear the Ray Stevens rendition of the Ray Charles classic "What'd I Say" aren't gong to like it. After all, they may ask, how can you top a Ray Charles recording?

I don't necessarily believe Ray Stevens set out to try and top the classic rendition from Ray Charles, though. I think that Ray Stevens simply wanted to record the song and so he did. I happen to love the rendition. Even if some may groan about the idea of someone other than the late Ray Charles performing that song at least it gives Ray Stevens an opportunity to display his obvious love for classic Rhythm and Blues music.

Aside from the song about Taylor Swift, one of my other favorites from this CD is "There Must Be a Pill For This". This one is vintage Ray Stevens...it tells the story of pills...and the enormous quantity of pills that are on the market for everything under the sun. Pills to help thick people lose weight, and pills to help frail people gain weight. It's a satire on pills...miracle pills, specifically...and as an added pleasure there's a parody of those lengthy disclaimers that appear as voice-overs on healthcare commercials.

The tempo changes for the next song, "Walkin' the Dog". In this one Ray sings of constantly bickering with his wife. Instead of moping around the house he simply goes outside, gets Rover, and walks the dog. He reckons that once he starts to take the dog for a walk he may run into a woman putting on the dog (presumably to be a possible new love interest). Track Five is thrilling...a cover of "Hearts Made of Stone". I looked up the song's title and found out that it had been a Rhythm and Blues hit in 1954 for a group called The Charms. I had heard a brief audio clip of Ray's recording on Amazon and since that time I had been wondering the reason for the 1950's-style of audio (complete with echo!) but I eventually found out the reason for the distinctive arrangement when discovering it had originally been recorded in the 1950s by The Charms as previously mentioned. It's clearly the stand-out song on the CD if only for it not vocally sounding like anything else. I love the over-dubbed do-wah harmonies heard throughout.

The most country sounding recording on the entire CD is "Pickin' on the Chicken". This one, too, is one of my favorites. In the song Ray sings from a chicken's point of view and he demands to know the reason so many negative expressions are associated with chickens, hens, and eggs. Throughout the song we're treated to a list of expressions and sayings that put the chicken in a bad light...expressions like 'madder than a wet hen'; 'that's chicken feed'; 'He's got egg on his face'; 'One flew the coop'; etc. Ray also manages to get in a reference to Willie Nelson, too, in a laugh out loud funny one-liner.

The second-most country sounding recording is "The Baptism of Stumpy Brown". The song is about an atheist that suddenly finds religion in his 90s and insists on being baptized as a result. The frail body in a raging river is bound to cause some incidents...and Ray tells of those in this story. Inspiration surfaces in the song "Little by Little". There is a song on here called "You Didn't Build That"...let's just say I find it hilarious...but it's something that more than likely is not going to go over too well with, say, fans of the President. That song is followed by a contemporary classic in the form of the illegal immigration anthem "Come to the U.S.A." (a song from 2010). Illegal immigration is a hot topic and one that's consistently controversial. Although I'm reviewing the CD there's an Mp3 copy for sale, too, and that means customers can pick and choose the songs they want to purchase from Here We Go Again!. I prefer having a physical copy of the CD.

Along the lines of manhood and masculinity comes "A Handshake Will Do", track 11. The lyrics cry foul on guys hugging other guys unless it's called for and Ray gives examples for when it's okay. Ironically, on the day this CD went on sale, a picture of Larry Gatlin attempting to hug Ray appeared on Ray's social media sites. There's no reference to this song as far as the picture is concerned, though. I call it just one of those ironic coincidences.

Ray had appeared as a guest artist on the Grand Ole Opry on March 21st on a segment hosted by Larry Gatlin.

The CD's closing track, "Knock Him Out John", is another one of my favorites. I call it a tribute to the late Jerry Clower. It's a recap of Jerry's story of the time he and some of his friends went hunting for raccoons and ended up having an encounter with a lynx. Ray's recording is the story set to music. Ray does his rendition of Jerry's holler and it appears at various moments during the song's chorus.

I thoroughly enjoyed the CD...his restless energy and incredible vocals are on full display on this CD!

***End of CD Review***

Yes, that's me displaying my economy sized pill box as a visual tie-in with one of the songs found on the 2015 CD, "There Must Be a Pill For This". The song is from the pen of Don Cusic and if you're a more dedicated fan of Ray Stevens then you're fully aware of Don Cusic or at least should be. He's written a couple of songs that Ray's recorded within the last 6 years. He wrote an essay within the pages of an accompanying booklet of Ray's 9-CD box set, The Encyclopedia of Recorded Comedy Music, in 2012. If you have Ray's 2014 memoir, Ray Stevens' Nashville, you'll see Don's name credited as the book's editor. Don wrote a gospel song that Ray recorded called "If Jesus is a Stranger" which can be found on Ray's CD, Gospel Collection, Volume One. I looked up his history and career at the time and discovered that he happened to be a college professor and had authored numerous books and is often referred to as a Professor of Music. Don wrote "There Must Be a Pill For This", by the way. When Ray's television series, CabaRay Nashville, debuted in the fall of 2015 Don Cusic appeared in several early episodes dressed in a graduate gown for a segment spotlighting a song featured in Ray's 9-CD box set. Don would give a brief history of the song prior to Ray's performance of it on the show. If you visit the Amazon link I provided for his 2015 comedy CD you'll notice there isn't credit listed for the songwriters. The CD comes with a fold-out mini booklet which contains the lyrics of all the songs, the writers, and the publishing company. It also features commentary from Ray on the back of the booklet.

Here is the track list and the songwriters:

1. Taylor Swift is Stalking Me (Ray Stevens, Chuck Redden, and Buddy Kalb)
2. What'd I Say (Ray Charles)
3. There Must Be a Pill For This (Don Cusic)
4. Walkin' the Dog (Jim Ferguson)
5. Hearts Made of Stone (Eddie Ray and Rudy Jackson)
6. Pickin' on the Chicken (Buddy Kalb)
7. The Baptism of Stumpy Brown (Buddy Kalb and Allison Speer)
8. Little By Little (Buddy Kalb)
9. You Didn't Build That (Ray Stevens, Chuck Redden, and Buddy Kalb)
10. Come to the U.S.A. (Buddy Kalb and Matt Cline)
11. A Handshake Will Do (Matt Cline and Max T. Barnes)
12. Knock Him Out, John (Buddy Kalb)

Excluding a Christmas CD release in 2016 the Here We Go Again! CD, to date, is the last studio album that Ray has issued. Yes, even though the 2016 Christmas release is technically his last studio album to date, I'm excluding it because it's a seasonal album. Since the release of the 2015 we've had the 2016 Christmas CD in addition to a couple of DVD releases featuring Season One and Season Two episodes of his CabaRay Nashville television series. In interviews since 2016/2017 Ray has often mentioned that he has a backlog of recordings awaiting release. He's been so busy, though...first off with the production of his television program...and then with the grand opening of the CabaRay showroom in 2018. So, as mentioned at the top of this blog entry, I'm hoping some new projects come along during the first half of 2020. Here's some trivia...it was on this date in 1962 that Ray recorded "Ahab the Arab". I usually don't have recording dates memorized but I was reading various websites during the writing of this blog entry and I came across that tidbit of information in a post on social media from Where Have All the Pop Stars Gone?. It's a Facebook page and I often write commentary whenever there's a post about Ray Stevens. I'll more than likely wait until this coming Friday to write another blog entry...on Ray's birthday...unless some major news is issued concerning the release of new music.

Ray Stevens: Flashback 2015...

I've decided to try out a series of flashback blog entries. I don't necessarily think it's considered repeating yourself because the commentary/opinions you'll be reading reflect my thoughts at the time of the writing...so it's not as if I'm copying/pasting past blog entry content and passing it off as new. In this experiment I've picked the year 2015. I pick that year because it's a pivotal year...a turning point in the career of Ray Stevens even though, like many other moments in his career, you don't notice it being a turning point until you're a couple years removed from it happening. Ray is the only recording artist that I can think of that can have multiple twists and turns in a career at any given moment and have it not negatively impact his career whatsoever or have it define his career.

Early in 2015 Ray released a comedy album, Here We Go Again!. This comedy album remains, to date, his last secular release. He issued a Christmas album in 2016 titled Mary and Joseph and the Baby and Me and then, in 2017, he released Just a Closer Walk With Thee/Gospel Favorites, a sequel to 2014's Gospel Collection, Volume One but Here We Go Again! remains his last album of mostly original songs. I say mostly original because the 2015 album included a couple of cover songs and the inclusion of a recording from 2010. As mentioned in the above paragraph this flashback experimental series of blog entries isn't going to copy/paste commentary I've made in the past. If anything I hope to pick up on things I may not have noticed or didn't think to comment on at the time.

Here We Go Again! contains 12 recordings of various styles. To be sure it's a comedy album...but there are a number of songs that channel early rock music as well as rhythm and blues. The album was released early in March of 2015...where it had followed the on-line release of a music video on YouTube from Ray on February 24th. It was a little out of the norm for Ray to issue a music video and then more or less a week later have the album it's on become available for purchase...usually there's a waiting period of several weeks between a lead-off single (in this case a lead-off music video) and the release of the album. Nevertheless the lead-off release from Here We Go Again! arrived in music video form on YouTube in the name of "Taylor Swift is Stalking Me". Ray co-wrote the song with Buddy Kalb and Chuck Redden and as you could guess the music video became a viral hit and, again, as you could guess, a lot of that had to do with the video's subject matter being Taylor Swift. The song/video came at a time when she was everywhere...country radio, pop radio, country music television, MTV, VH-1, magazine covers that catered to various music formats, etc. etc. and at the same time there were a lot of really bizarre stories popping up on-line of people thinking that they were being stalked by the singer. The utterly bizarre nature of such claims goes hand-in-hand with Ray's song. There's a twist ending to the story but you'll have to wait until near the end of the song to hear it.

On the back of the CD you'll see the track list written on a mock-up of an airline arrival board. The front of the CD, above, has Ray at an airport setting in front of a Limo...with a gorilla being the chauffeur. If you look in the background you'll see a trailer of a semi truck with Clyde Van Lines written on it above the Clyde Records logo. The irony is this CD was released on Player Records which I'm assuming served as an in-house label and I don't think the Player imprint appeared on any further releases from Ray. There's a mini fold-out booklet contained within the CD sleeve. The booklet features a photo of Ray and his comments surrounding the CD and there's lyrics printed for all of the songs, too. "Taylor Swift is Stalking Me" continues to attract unique views but a recent statistical search shows that it's gotten more than 2.3 million unique views. Included on this CD is another song Ray co-wrote with Buddy Kalb and Chuck Redden. The trio wrote "You Didn't Build That" and it became a music video on YouTube, ironically enough, four years ago yesterday: May 19, 2015. That particular music video's gotten a little over 300,000 unique views. The CD also features, as mentioned earlier, a song from 2010 titled "Come to the USA". On the album it follows "You Didn't Build That". Elsewhere on the album there's his cover of "Hearts Made of Stone" which I had to look up back in 2015 because Ray sings it against a background reminiscent of the 1950s. I had initially thought that Ray performed the song like that on purpose and that it was a new song but then I thought that maybe it's a cover song. Ray does his version of "What'd I Say", a classic originally recorded by one of Ray's music heroes, Ray Charles. "There Must Be a Pill For This" was written by Don Cusic and that's a name that's become associated with Ray over the last 5+ years. Don helped put together the 2012 9-CD project, The Encyclopedia of Recorded Comedy Music, and he later supplied Ray with a couple of original gospel songs: 2014's "If Jesus is a Stranger" and 2017's "Just a Touch of Jesus". The latter co-written with Buddy Kalb. You can purchase the 2015 album, as well as most of the music Ray has issued over the last 10 to 15 years, at his web-store. Here's the product page for the 2015 ALBUM.

In addition to this comedy album in 2015 and the two music video hits that emerged from it the biggest and some might say shocking and unexpected news of the year came in the late summer/early fall of 2015. It was around the late summer time frame that on-line reports began to show up revolving around Ray's plans of becoming a television talk show host. The episodes of this as yet to be announced series had already been recorded weeks in advance and so on November 7, 2015 the debut episode of Ray Stevens' Nashville aired on RFD-TV with Steve Wariner as the special guest. In the first and second seasons of the show there was a segment featuring Don Cusic dressed in a graduate's gown, referred to as Professor Cusic: Doctor of Music, giving historical information about an upcoming song Ray was to perform. A lot of the information was tied into the mini-book he wrote for Ray's 2012 encyclopedia box set. Don happens to be a real college professor and so it was like art imitating life. The television series became a popular show on RFD-TV throughout 2016. The popularity led to more episodes being produced throughout the year. In total 26 first-run episodes and a Christmas themed episode aired between November 7, 2015 and December 31, 2016. This time frame also included the repeat cycle of all 27 episodes. In fact, RFD-TV aired a marathon of episodes as special programming on New Year's Eve.

The show had reportedly become the top rated series on the cable network but upon concluding it's repeat cycle Ray announced that the series was departing RFD for local PBS syndication. 52 first run episodes aired in local PBS syndication beginning in July of 2017 (following a repeat period of the 26 episodes originally shown on RFD). Those repeats were airing in the first half of 2017 on local PBS stations. The first-run PBS exclusives began on July 7, 2017 and the last first-run episode aired the weekend of July 6, 2018. By this time the name of the series had changed to Ray Stevens CabaRay Nashville. The change in name happened in January 2017 when the show began airing on PBS. The show continues airing all over the country on local PBS stations and in December 2018 it returned to the RFD airwaves, too, in it's former time-slot on Saturday nights. Ever since the debut of his television program in the latter half of 2015 and continuing on with the 2018 opening of his showroom, CabaRay, Ray's career has gone through various twists and turns that nobody would have expected at the beginning of 2015 when "Taylor Swift is Stalking Me" and Here We Go Again! made their debuts. 

Ray Stevens: Pigeon Forge concert...

Hello all...and for me this has certainly been a memorable October introduction as far as the change in weather is concerned. Normally there isn't such a drastic change in temperatures but the last couple of days it's not gotten above 55 degrees. A return to normalcy is on the way, though, as today's high is going to be the upper 60s.

Speaking of numbers...the current unique views for "You Didn't Build That" are 54,927. This is a pick-up of 4,175 since my previous blog post.

This past Saturday Ray made a guest appearance on the Opry. He appeared during the final half hour segment of the night. Mel Tillis hosted the segment. Ray performed "Misty" and "Mississippi Squirrel Revival". Ray told a story about monkey's in outer space and he spoke of his upcoming television series...the program is called Ray Stevens' Nashville (the same name of his memoir). If you visit Ray's Facebook page you'll see that the banner's changed to reflect the upcoming series (it changed on September 29th). Mel, in his introduction, remarked that the program is to debut on November 7th on RFD-TV. Also mentioned in the introduction was the availability of Ray's current CD, Here We Go Again!. Mel referenced his famous stutter during the promo for Ray's CD.

Ray's completed several of his concerts since my previous blog post (the SKyPAC concert happened yesterday, October 2nd) and today he'll be doing 2 concerts at the Country Tonight venue in Pigeon Forge, TN. You can read about those concerts in this promo...

PIGEON FORGE

After tonight's pair of concerts in Pigeon Forge Ray's next appearance is up north in Canada at the Casino Rama venue on October 9th. Since it's a Casino there's an age restriction: 19 years and up. It's my assumption that he'll sing "Sgt. Preston of the Yukon" either as part of a medley or perhaps in full performance...it's an obvious choice and it's too irresistible to omit from the set-list. You can hear that 1960 recording and other early recording on this CD. It covers a lot of ground as far as the earliest of Ray's commercial recordings (dating back to 1957). The inclusion of those rare single releases Ray's first 2 studio albums for Mercury Records in their entirety make this one of the better compilation releases...one of the best of the last 5 to 10 years.

"Sgt. Preston of the Yukon" is a pivotal song in his career...if it weren't for his writing and recording the song in 1960 and it becoming a near-hit (before being pulled off the air for copyright reasons) he probably never would've thought of issuing comedy/novelty music at all. The fact of the 1960 novelty song getting a lot of attention and airplay (more than anything he previously had out on the market) gave Ray the idea that comedy songs could get him attention...and the rest is history as they say.

Ray Stevens: Alabama Theatre 9/19/2015...

Hello once more...in following the advertisements currently underway on social media sites I, too, am here to spread the word about the upcoming concert in North Myrtle Beach from Ray Stevens at The Alabama Theatre.

You can read the article/interview about the upcoming concert by clicking HERE. As you'll learn in the article the concert is this Saturday night, September 19th at 7pm. All of the details (such as ticket prices and an overview of his career) can be found in the link. The article is decent and does a good job at mentioning some of the songs from Ray's catalog that usually do not get much coverage and it incorporates some of the latest happenings in his career instead of being almost exclusively focused on past accomplishment as a lot of concert promo's of established artists tend to be. The article promotes his 2012 project, The Encyclopedia of Recorded Comedy Music, as if it's just been released but I commented about Ray having a comedy CD out of brand new recordings, too. You can purchase this CD at AMAZON where it's gotten rave reviews. Strangely enough it's not available in his on-line store...and it's been half a year since it's debut back in March...but above is the Amazon link and here's the cover photo...

In the meantime a couple of posts on the social media site of Twitter, from the Washington, D.C branch of The National Guard, included pics of Ray Stevens from an appearance at the Opry House Sunday night (yesterday). The performance was apparently closed to the general public but pictures of Ray on the Opry stage in performance, before a crowd of National Guard members and presumably their family and friends, appeared on-line. You can find those pics by doing a simple search for Ray Stevens or a search for NGAUS while at that particular social media site.

Ray Stevens: The Taylor Swift Music Video, Entry 12...

Hello once more to the fan-created blog focusing on the music and goings-on in the world of Ray Stevens. In my previous blog entry I mentioned the sale of one of Ray's DVDs, Such a Night: 50 Years of Hits and Hilarity. The sale runs until the end of this month. You can visit the product page HERE and purchase your copy. This DVD has only been available exclusively on Ray's website since 2012 and offered at the merchandise table at concerts. It's never been the object of television advertising and so the general public is probably not aware of it's existence and it's not been officially marketed for sale on Amazon even though consumers often offer copies of it for sale in the Marketplace area. The concert footage comes from performances at The Welk Theatre and Resort in Branson, Missouri.

I had been noticing the increasing number of unique views of Ray's "Taylor Swift is Stalkin' Me" video and it passed the 300,000 mark earlier this morning.



One of the more bizarre things in entertainment news is the recent flap over the criticism of a current song from Taylor Swift by Miley Cyrus. I read the original commentary and the point Cyrus happened to be making about double standards, ageism, and sexism. Although this isn't the place for any kind of argue and debate, especially about non-Ray Stevens subject matter, I brought it up because half of the subject matter ties into Ray's music video. The current total of unique views for that particular video are 300,222. The song/music video had been heavily promoted by Ray through appearances on a couple of radio talk shows and a couple of appearances at the Grand Ole Opry...all of it leading up to the release of his current CD, Here We Go Again! in late March.

The CD spawned the current mini-tour he's been on...his next concert appearance is scheduled for September 12th at The Andy Williams Theatre in Branson, Missouri. Tickets to this concert became available awhile back and so it may be sold-out or a near sell-out. You'll have to call 1-800-MOON-094 to find out any information. I'd posted about this concert several months ago...several times...but now it's only a calendar month away from taking place. The tickets happened to go on sale back on May 18th. Click the upcoming link and you'll be able to read much more information about the appearance via this PRESS RELEASE. It contains a local number to call in case you're in the general area.

On September 19th he'll be in Myrtle Beach, South Carolina at The Alabama Theatre. You can click HERE for information. If you're like me you'll like the advertisement for his appearance...the image from the Ray Stevens Gospel Collection, Volume One is being used as a publicity photo.

On September 26th Ray appears for the third time this year as a guest on the Grand Ole Opry. I can't recall any other year that Ray's made as many guest appearances at the members-only Grand Ole Opry. In addition to that third Opry guest appearance Ray had also appeared on the Opry Country Classics radio series hosted by Larry Gatlin several months ago. Ray's never been a member of the Grand Ole Opry...can't understand why he's never become a member by now...he lives in Nashville, too...but nevertheless he'll make another guest appearance next month.

In addition to the current CD and the music videos, "Taylor Swift is Stalkin' Me" and "You Didn't Build That", let's remember that Ray has a memoir on the market titled Ray Stevens' Nashville. The book can be purchased on several sites but I often supply a link to my Amazon review located HERE. Once there you'll see the Add to Cart button over on the right hand side of the page.

Here's a Ray Stevens 50 year time capsule in 6 lines:

1965: Mercury Records releases the novelty single "Rockin' Teenage Mummies".

1975: Barnaby Records releases the single, "Misty", and it takes home a Grammy.

1985: MCA Records album He Thinks He's Ray Stevens is certified Gold.

1995: Direct-to-Home Video movie, Get Serious!, is released.

2005: Records the novelty single "We're Having a Baby (The Natural Way)".

2015: Releases 2 comedy music videos and the CD Here We Go Again!

Of course that's just a generic time capsule and nothing incredibly detailed at all and it only covers the previous 50 years, in 10 year increments, dating back to 1965...and we all know Ray's music career dates back to 1957. I thought it rather amusing to compress 50 years into 6 lines...it can be seen as a satiric look at modern day biographers, too, because of this lack of detail and depth I purposely gave the time capsule. If I wanted to get detailed I could've pointed out activity in Ray's career in every single year from 1965 through the present but I chose not to...this blog entry is long enough as it is...but there's some other things I want to highlight and so the blog entry is going to become longer...

In the 50+ year of Ray Stevens the re-releasing of studio albums is a part of the cycle. Record companies and their subsidiaries and independent labels getting license to issue previously recorded songs is commonplace. In 1997 Ray Stevens released a comedy album for MCA titled Hum It. The album features Ray on the cover as a referee in a picture frame next to a visual parody of Whister's Mother (also Ray Stevens). Curb Records reissued the 1997 CD in 2011...accompanied by a slightly different visual appearance in cover art...

The original release, from March 1997, tickled the funny bones of most of the music critics. A lot of attention tended to be given to the cover art...some mistakenly thinking that Ray appeared as Mother Bates instead of Whistler's Mother on the cover. I believe it took place in an interview with Crook and Chase but Ray was eventually asked why he dressed up as Norman Bates' mother on the CD cover and that led him to explain the concept behind the cover art. Ray explained that the album's title is based on the idea that Whistler's Mother is tired of whistling and from now on she'll just 'hum it' instead of whistling. The Ray referee in the picture blowing a whistle right next to the "mother" suddenly made a lot of sense to those that couldn't originally understand the concept behind the cover art. Once this little bit of curiosity was solved the focus became the music. One of the highlights of the album is "Mama Sang Bass"...it represents a rare time in the career of Ray Stevens that he performs a duet...but not in the conventional sense. In this case J.D. Sumner, famed bass singer, appears on the recording as Mama. Ray plays the part of Daddy in a high, tenor voice. The song's story takes place in a church setting, mostly, as Ray tells about a couple that work in factories that ultimately impact their chemical structure. Mama worked in a plant that made steroids and Daddy worked in a plant that manufactured birth control pills. As time goes by Mama seems to be developing attributes conventionally applied to men. Daddy, meanwhile, sees a reversal too...each going so far as to change habits. Daddy becomes family cook and Mama finds herself needing to shave her face. Ray performed this song only once on television...J.D. Sumner himself appeared on the program and had a lot of fun playing Mama. Ray promoted a couple of other songs from the album, though, in music video format: "Virgil and the Moonshot" and "Too Drunk To Fish". This being 1997 and years before the creation of YouTube and social media as we know it the videos didn't get the kind of exposure they currently do via social media. An audience of more than 64,000 have seen the video of Virgil's adventure in outer space. On the other hand an audience of almost a million have seen "Too Drunk To Fish". The current total number of unique vies for that video are 999,983!! The video needs 17 more discoveries to reach a million. Please note that the video's uploaded by a channel called RayStevensVEVO and not the usual RayStevensMusic. However, this music video's long been available on-line and it'll be nice to see it crack the million mark...the embed closes out the blog entry.

Curb Records, as mentioned, reissued this CD in 2011. If you glance back up at the 1997 release the background color is a bit more green and this one is much darker. Also the lettering is changed. Instead of Ray's name appearing across the top of the cover it appears beneath the photo of the referee and the title appears in bigger letters underneath his name. Also the color of the lettering has changed from yellow to white. Also, the color is so dark that one can't see the chair as you can in the 1997 release. In addition to the songs I mentioned the rest of the CD features songs ranging from amusing to charming. One of the amusing is "She Loves Elvis Better Than Me"...a tale of a guy whose wife has a flirtation with the late King of Rock and Roll. The album opens up with a rollicking tale of family fun in an "R.V." that seems to create more chaos than comfort. On the charming level is "I'll Be In Atlanta". I love that song!! It's got a great arrangement/melody steeped in Dixieland and it's fun to listen to Ray incorporate imagery and characters from Gone with The Wind. Even though it's never explicitly stated that he's doing so you can't help but think of the film as he name drops the likes of Scarlett, Rhett, Melanie, Ashley, Prissy, Mammy, and the plantation house of Tara. Ray performed this song a couple of times on television appearances in the mid 1990s. Did I forget to mention I love the Dixieland arrangement??

Ray Stevens: The Taylor Swift Music Video, entry Eleven...

Hello all...it's a very early Monday morning but I felt like getting the week started with a blog entry featuring some updates on the current music video from Ray Stevens, "Taylor Swift is Stalking Me". As of this moment the video's gotten 136,300 unique views...this is a pick-up of 9,737 additional discoveries since my previous posting of the numbers. 



As I mentioned in my previous blog post Ray performed the song at the Opry this past Saturday night along with "Hearts Made of Stone" (it's the second time he performed the Taylor song). Each of those songs are on his current comedy CD, Here We Go Again!, and that particular release can be purchased through various on-line stores such as AMAZON. That link takes you to the CD's product page.

In the meantime how many people out there have a lot of Ray Stevens in your personal collections? I have a lot of his songs in one format or another (LP's, 45's, cassettes, CD's, and Mp3) and I've got several magazines that either have articles about him or feature interviews with him...some of those magazines have Ray on the cover which is an added plus. I have VHS tapes and DVDs of his music videos and I have some of his television appearances from The Nashville Network on VHS (appearances from the mid-late 1990s). A long held desire of mine had been to gain possession of every television appearance/performance Ray Stevens ever did. That happened to be a goal of mine during my teen years...as I've long since been an adult I've realized such a goal is highly unobtainable but at least I can say I have all of Ray's studio albums in one format or another. Starting with the release of 1,837 Seconds of Humor in 1962 and ending, for the moment, with the 2015 release of Here We Go Again!.

The one format that I don't have any of Ray's songs is 8-track...I don't even have any 8-track cartridges anymore nor do I possess an 8-track player. I've posted about 8-tracks before and the nostalgia factor that accompanies them but I don't think I'd enjoy listening to an 8-track nowadays...a lot of the ones my grandparent's had featured songs broken in multiple parts (lots of fade in and fade outs). I've become too accustomed to hearing songs in their entirety with no interruption...there's also the fact that an 8-track can malfunction easier than a cassette. 

Any mechanism that has a reel of tape is vulnerable to technical glitches but through experience the 8-track seemed to be more vulnerable to the reel of tape being ate...and pulling an 8-track out of it's slot after something like that happens can damage the actual player. In the meantime check out Here We Go Again! from Ray Stevens...the latest offering from the Clown Prince of Country Music...

Ray Stevens: April 18th Opry re-cap...

Hello once more...as promised in my previous blog entry here's a brief re-cap of the Ray Stevens guest appearance on the Grand Ole Opry yesterday evening. In my blog entry from yesterday I erroneously stated that the Opry's host during Ray's appearance was going to be Jim Ed Brown. Unless I had been thinking of him earlier in the day or happened to see a picture of him, or, had actually seen his name listed in close proximity to Ray's I never would've posted the wrong information but something told my brain to type Jim Ed and that's what I happened to do but in actuality the host of the Opry segment that Ray appeared on happened to be the family group, The Whites. The half hour segment featured songs by them and a couple of songs by a gospel artist named Chris August...and then it came time for Ray Stevens!

Ray came out and spoke about his current Here We Go Again! comedy CD. He mentioned that his previous guest appearance at the Opry took place only a couple of weeks ago and that he performed a certain song that night...and due to demand he performed it once more...the song being "Taylor Swift is Stalkin' Me". He followed-up the performance with "Hearts Made of Stone" (!).
The live performance doesn't have the echo effect that the studio recording has and I was completely surprised that he chose that particular song to spotlight considering some of the other songs on the CD have more of a country flavor but I'm glad he performed the song, though. At least I can say I heard him perform the song in case he never performs it again. In case you missed the April 18th performance you can check the Opry's Archive page. At the moment the page is updated through April 14th (this past Tuesday Night Opry broadcast). You'll have to periodically keep checking the Opry Archive Page to see when they upload the April 18th broadcast. I'll also do the same and of course I'll post a link to the April 18th broadcast in a future blog post. Remember, though, the link I'll be posting in a future blog is for the complete broadcast...it isn't going to be a link to only the segment Ray Stevens appears on. The first segment is hosted by Jeannie Seely. 

Ray Stevens: April 18th...Opry Guest Appearance...

Good late afternoon, early evening!! Ray Stevens is scheduled to make a guest appearance on the Opry tonight at 7:30pm Central, 8:30pm Eastern. This is a rather quick follow-up guest appearance for Ray...he appeared on the Opry last month (in a segment hosted by Larry Gatlin) and performed his current hit, "Taylor Swift is Stalkin' Me", for the first time.

On tonight's Opry Ray is going to appear in the segment hosted by Jim Ed Brown. He may perform the Taylor song again or he may spotlight something completely different. You can listen to the Opry performance by clicking HERE and then clicking the appropriate listening options once the page opens. I'll post a re-cap either later tonight or tomorrow about Ray's Opry segment.

The music video for Ray's current hit has obtained 134,093 unique views so far.

I came across a recent interview of Ray Stevens...this one appeared on YouTube today and it's conducted by an interviewer named Rabbi Sol Solomon. It appears as part of an internet series called Dave's Gone By. You can hear the interview HERE. I happened to like it...Ray gets a lot of time to discuss various aspects of his career and those he's worked with in the music industry. Near the end the host brings up Ray's 9-CD box set, The Encyclopedia of Recorded Comedy Music. Some of the other subjects discussed include his current CD, Here We Go Again!, the Ray Stevens' Nashville memoir, political comedy, and the dramatic changes in the music industry and the impact of social media.

Ray Stevens: The Taylor Swift Music Video, entry 10...

Hello one and all...I'm back! Since the completion of my previous blog entry baseball season has started and the onslaught of rain and severe weather has prevented me from making too many detailed blogs (for the fear the electric going out in the middle of typing). Also, I'm trying to get used to these new eye glasses...they're not as comfortable as my other pair...I've actually been wearing the other pair more than the new ones.

In addition to that I deliberately wanted the blog entry about the negative impact that the healthcare law has had on my insurance coverage to be the first blog entry visitors see if they happen to access this page via it's main link.

The current music video from Ray Stevens, "Taylor Swift is Stalkin' Me", has had an increase in discoveries since my previous blog entry on April 5th...jumping from 115,889 to 126,563...a pickup of 10,674 unique views (for those keeping track). As you can see I posted/embedded the music video at the top of the blog entry. The video debuted on February 24th and so you can see that it's fast approaching 2 months of on-line availability...13 days to go.

The song itself can be found on his current CD, Here We Go Again!. The CD can be purchased on-line practically everywhere. Here's a link to the AMAZON product page. Once there you can either purchase the CD or search for the Mp3 copy if that's your personal preferred purchase choice. The CD became available for pre-order in February...it's official release happened on March 23. Since the time of it's release it's appeared on Billboard's Top Comedy Albums chart...debuting in the April 11th edition among the Top-10 best selling comedy releases that week. I looked on Billboard's on-line site a couple of days ago and unfortunately the CD isn't in the Top-10 for the week ending April 18th. It and another comedy project fell off to make room for a couple of debuts.

One of the drawbacks to having a 10 position sales chart is once you have the big opening week sales performance a CD usually settles into it's average sales pace and if it's not among the 10 releases in the comedy genre to sell a certain amount in a given week then it doesn't rank among the top-10 (regardless of any additional sales it obtained). Some of the CD's listed on the comedy survey have been charted for more than 1 year (!). Having said that I don't know if total weeks indicate consecutive or non-consecutive. Considering it's a 10 position chart the turnover rate is astronomical and so I'd guess and say the total number of chart weeks for the CD's on the Top Comedy Albums chart indicate non-consecutive totals. If anybody has any information you can post a comment. In my settings I have it designed so that I can read submitted comments before they're posted. So, if you submit something and I feel that it comes across cohesive and on topic I'll publish those kinds of comments. I don't publish comments that offer links and I definitely refuse to publish any comment that speaks negative toward Ray Stevens.

I may have posted this already but this is the CD of Here We Go Again! that I ordered from Amazon. I call it the non-autographed copy. I have a copy that I received in the mail a couple of days before the CD went on sale...it has an autograph by Ray Stevens and a note above his autograph personally thanking me. Also, it goes without saying, but I hope you all watch his latest music video from start to finish. It has a nice shot of Ray at the video's close standing inside his recording studio, grinning, and displaying disbelief that he put together a music video like that (an example of self-deprecation). As I mentioned earlier the music video's approaching it's 2 month 'anniversary' and it's anybody's guess if there's going to be a follow-up music video or not. I hope there's going to be some additional music videos...but marketing is going to be key in my opinion. I still believe that the song, "A Handshake Will Do", has music video written all over it. The kinds of sight gags that could be inserted into a visual production is too irresistible to by-pass. "You Didn't Build That" is another song that, if I happened to be making the decisions, I'd find too tempting to pass up. I hope either or both of those songs become music videos at some point this year. 

Ray Stevens: The Taylor Swift Music Video, entry 9...

Hello one and all! This Easter Sunday finds me updating this fan created blog page...my previous blog post arrived on March 29th, for those curious, and so it hasn't been a lengthy hiatus (only 5 days). During my 5 day hiatus Ray gave some interviews to some radio programs about his current CD and the music video that's helped promote the CD's availability but yet that isn't the biggest news surrounding the latest CD. I look for more announcements about the accomplishment to trickle out this week, though. It'll no doubt add to the publicity that the music video's already given the CD.

A couple of the radio interviews that Ray participated in included a call to a station in Mississippi billed as Super Talk during a shift hosted by an air personality called J.T. The program's title, The J.T. Show, has archives and those can be found HERE. Search for the April 2nd, first hour, audio link in his program's archive page. It's an illustration of live radio, too, because Ray had to push back his call-in until the last segment. According to the host Ray was suppose to be on earlier during the hour...but never fear, the host plays several Ray Stevens songs throughout to keep listeners enticed.

Secondly there's an interview conducted by Tom Gulley and you can listen to it HERE. In this interview, around the time the conversation glides into music videos, the phone connection goes out but Ray's quickly re-connected and goes about the interview describing the success that music videos have had in his career during the last 20+ years and how the creation of social media has enhanced his ability to reach audiences that otherwise may have never heard of him.

In the meantime the music video for "Taylor Swift is Stalkin' Me" grabbed an additional 12,196 people during the last several days to bring it's unique view total at the moment to 115,889.



For those that hadn't purchased his current CD, Here We Go Again!, you can do so HERE. It takes you to the Amazon product page.

Ray Stevens: The Taylor Swift Music Video, entry 8...

Hello once again...I felt that it's about time I posted some updated numbers concerning the current YouTube video from Ray Stevens, "Taylor Swift is Stalking Me". In my previous blog entry I noted that the video had spiked in unique views largely on the strength of an article that appeared on Billboard magazine's website. It had jumped to 93,509...a pickup of more than 15,000 additional discoveries. Today finds the video having gotten 103,693 unique views and that's an increase of 10,184 discoveries during the last 2 and a half days.

Given that the video's vaulted past the 100,000 mark I suspect that the video is going to go in one of 2 different directions from here on out.

One direction might be that the video is going to be picked up and shared on various news websites in their Entertainment sections and reach a non-music audience for the first time. A non-music audience is my way of describing the audience that by and large visits news and political websites rather than visiting music sites or keeping up on the latest music releases.

Another direction that the music video might go in since it's broken into the 100,000 level is to just coast along...picking up a couple thousand unique views here and a couple thousand there. I don't think the video is going to be the single biggest publicity tool for his current CD, though. He has a couple of concerts scheduled in June...but with this being March...I just can't imagine he'll ride the current music video for 3 more months but Ray likes to plan ahead a lot of the time and he may have things planned further down the road.

As I've long since pointed out Ray Stevens is entirely unpredictable and he lives in his own universe and I mean that in a positive way. Once you get the sense that you can predict something he'll do he does something radically different than expected. He doesn't follow a set pattern even if it may seem like he does.

Now, the reason I doubt that the music video is going to be the current one from Ray by the time June rolls around is because I feel the video's possibly reached it's peak during the last couple of days after it's exposure in the Billboard article and I explain my reasoning below...

As mentioned in the opening paragraph the video received more than 15,000 unique views in the hours after the Billboard article hit the social media sites and then during the last couple of days the video's racked up 10,184 additional discoveries. That's more than 25,000 unique views over the course of a 5 calendar day period (March 24-March 29).

Unless there's some additional high profile publicity for the music video enabling it to reach the same amount of an audience size that it reached this past week the video may just coast along until the follow-up arrives. Here's the video...



You can purchase the Mp3 of Ray's current release, Here We Go Again!, on Amazon by clicking HERE. If you prefer a CD copy, as I do, you can click HERE. The page opens up to my customer review of the CD. To order the CD just click the Add to Cart button on the left side of the page next to the review. All fans of Ray Stevens are sure to love the CD as much as I do...

Ray Stevens: The Taylor Swift Music Video, entry 7...

Hello all!! Throughout the course of Tuesday and into Wednesday the latest CD from Ray Stevens fluctuated all over the Top-100 on Amazon's sales list. Also, there happened to be a couple of articles published on Ray that were shared on social media sites...the articles included links to the CD and the current music video was embedded in some of those articles, too.

One of the articles is posted on the Vintage Vinyl News site located  HERE.

The article that got the biggest amount of sharing originated on Billboard's SITE. This exposure no doubt led to the video's hike in unique views. The last blog entry I posted in which I reported on the video numbers (back on March 21st) the video had reached 78,041. Looking at the numbers at the moment there's been a leap to 93,509!! A total of 15,468 additional people seen "Taylor Swift is Stalkin' Me" over the course of the last couple of days.

Since the video's gotten even more exposure than before the critics have also started to chime in with their negative points of view. Everything from "does he think this is funny??", to "he's still alive??", to "this is pathetic...insulting..." have come raining down on the video. As mentioned in previous blogs the reason I embed music videos is to avoid a direct link to a video's home page...because usually the home page of a video is filled with mean and hateful commentary (particularly true for the political comedy videos he did).



In the meantime...did any of you stumble upon my review of Ray's CD? I posted it yesterday and then I posted it over on Amazon. In case you didn't see it here's the AMAZON review. Currently there are 2 customer reviews...mine being one of them. Someone actually beat me to being the first customer review by a couple of hours. You can leave commentary or rate my customer review if you'd like...you can also purchase the CD if you hadn't done so already. The Mp3 is also available, too! You can purchase it on Amazon by clicking HERE.

Ray Stevens: Here We Go Again! CD...My Review...

***My review of Ray's current CD contains spoilers! If you don't want to read about the songs or learn of any of the hooks, phrases, or some of the lyrics then don't read the rest of this blog entry***

After taking a detour, of sorts, over the last 5+ years and releasing some hilarious political songs on a couple of CD's, plus issuing a 9-CD box set called The Encyclopedia of Recorded Comedy Music (containing his versions of novelty songs of the last 50+ years), a majestic gospel CD last year called Gospel Collection, Volume One, and a memoir titled Ray Stevens' Nashville...after those projects, Ray Stevens returns to country comedy on his latest CD. The cover art, as you can see, takes place in an airport setting. In a touch of silliness, a gorilla plays the part of the chauffeur. On the back of the CD the songs are listed as if they're flights posted on the Arrival board. The CD's first single release arrived in music video form a month ago...titled "Taylor Swift is Stalkin' Me" it's a story of a man that's obsessed ith the belief that he's being stalked by the pop-country singer because, according to him, he sees her everywhere and given that her likeness appears everywhere he happens to be he thinks she's stalking him. The song has a comical twist ending, though. Throughout the song he insists that Taylor's up in a tree looking at him with binoculars.

After the bouncy opening track about Taylor we're treated to Ray covering one of his musical idols, Ray Charles. I pretty much know that the purists that'll hear the Ray Stevens rendition of the Ray Charles classic "What'd I Say" aren't gong to like it. After all, they may ask, how can you top a Ray Charles recording?

I don't necessarily believe Ray Stevens set out to try and top the classic rendition from Ray Charles, though. I think that Ray Stevens simply wanted to record the song and so he did. I happen to love the rendition. Even if some may groan about the idea of someone other than the late Ray Charles performing that song at least it gives Ray Stevens an opportunity to display his obvious love for classic Rhythm and Blues music.

Aside from the song about Taylor Swift, one of my other favorites from this CD is "There Must Be a Pill For This". This one is vintage Ray Stevens...it tells the story of pills...and the enormous quantity of pills that are on the market for everything under the sun. Pills to help thick people lose weight, and pills to help frail people gain weight. It's a satire on pills...miracle pills, specifically...and as an added pleasure there's a parody of those lengthy disclaimers that appear as voice-overs on healthcare commercials.

The tempo changes for the next song, "Walkin' the Dog". In this one Ray sings of constantly bickering with his wife. Instead of moping around the house he simply goes outside, gets Rover, and walks the dog. He reckons that once he starts to take the dog for a walk he may run into a woman putting on the dog (presumably to be a possible new love interest). Track Five is thrilling...a cover of "Hearts Made of Stone". I looked up the song's title and found out that it had been a Rhythm and Blues hit in 1954 for a group called The Charms. I had heard an audio clip of Ray's recording and since that time I had been wondering the reason for the 1950's-style of audio (complete with echo!) and I eventually found out the reason. It's clearly the stand-out song on the CD if only for it not vocally sounding like anything else. I love the over-dubbed do-wah harmonies heard throughout.

The most country sounding recording on the entire CD is "Pickin' on the Chicken". This one, too, is one of my favorites. In the song Ray sings from a chicken's point of view and he demands to know the reason so many negative expressions are associated with chickens, hens, and eggs. Throughout the song we're treated to a list of expressions and sayings that put the chicken in a bad light...expressions like 'madder than a wet hen'; 'that's chicken feed'; 'He's got egg on his face'; 'One flew the coop'; etc. Ray also manages to get in a reference to Willie Nelson, too, in a laugh out loud funny one-liner.

The second-most country sounding recording is "The Baptism of Stumpy Brown". The song is about an atheist that suddenly finds religion in his 90s and insists on being baptized as a result. The frail body in a raging river is bound to cause some incidents...and Ray tells of those in this story. Inspiration surfaces in the song "Little by Little". There is a song on here called "You Didn't Build That"...let's just say I find it hilarious...but it's something that more than likely is not going to go over too well with, say, fans of the President. That song is followed by a contemporary classic in the form of the illegal immigration anthem "Come to the U.S.A." (a song from 2010). Illegal immigration is a hot topic and one that's consistently controversial. Although I'm reviewing the CD there's an Mp3 copy for sale, too, and that means customers can pick and choose the songs they want to purchase from Here We Go Again! I prefer having a physical copy of the CD.

Along the lines of manhood and masculinity comes "A Handshake Will Do", track 11. The lyrics cry foul on guys hugging other guys unless it's called for and Ray gives examples for when it's okay. Ironically, on the day this CD went on sale, a picture of Larry Gatlin attempting to hug Ray appeared on Ray's social media sites. There's no reference to this song, as far as the picture is concerned, though. I call it just one of those ironic coincidences.

Ray had appeared as a guest artist on the Grand Ole Opry on March 21st on a segment hosted by Larry Gatlin.

The CD's closing track, "Knock Him Out John", is another one of my favorites. I call it a tribute to the late Jerry Clower. It's a recap of Jerry's story of the time he and some of his friends went hunting for racoons and ended up having an encounter with a lynx. Ray's recording is the story set to music. Ray does his rendition of Jerry's holler and it appears at various moments during the song's chorus.

I thoroughly enjoyed the CD...his restless energy and incredible vocals are on full display on this CD!

Ray Stevens: Here We Go Again! CD now available...

Hello all and a happy CD release day, too! Oh yes, the Ray Stevens CD that I've been blogging about the last couple of months is finally available for purchase starting today. It's been available for pre-order since late February but today is the official release day for Here We Go Again!, a 12 song CD.

I had gotten a surprise in my mailbox at the post office...an article of mail had arrived from Clyde Records. I didn't remember ordering anything from Ray's store and so I opened up the small, padded envelope and I got a surprise...a signed copy of Ray's CD!! I've never received anything like that before!!

Although I already have an order put in for it on AMAZON (a pre-order from late February), could you imagine the baffled emotions racing through my mind as I opened up the envelope to see not only the CD but a message from Ray, too.

The message was inside a smaller envelope the was shipped inside the padded envelope and it sat underneath the CD and it explained the reason for my being sent a copy of the CD.

In case you're wondering I listened to the CD once...and I'll be listening to it more before I post my thoughts about it. This particular copy of the CD is going to be put away later on because of the autograph on the front. The one that arrives from Amazon is going to be the one I'll have sitting around amongst my other CD's. The copy I ordered on Amazon was shipped out earlier this morning from a facility in North Carolina and so it should arrive here by the end of the week.

 

Ray Stevens: The Taylor Swift Music Video, entry 6...

Hello all...a very early Saturday morning check-in has me delivering the latest totals of the Ray Stevens hit video, "Taylor Swift is Stalkin' Me". In my previous blog entry I made mention of the video reaching 72,120...this morning has the video sitting at 78,041. This is a pickup of 5,921 unique views. The song kicks off his upcoming CD, Here We Go Again!, which you all can still pre-order on several on-line music stores (Amazon, Itunes, CD Universe).

Also, for the first time since the CD became available for pre-order purchase, you can visit Ray's ON-LINE STORE and place an order, too. If Ray had made purchasing from his store available sooner I would've bought directly from his site, like I typically do, but considering the CD wasn't available for pre-order last month I chose Amazon since that's the on-line store I shop at anyhow. Ray's selling the CD for the current price that's listed on Amazon (which is $10.99). Ray's shipping and handling rates are a bit higher, though, and so if you choose to buy direct from his site you'll pay just a little more than at Amazon, maybe a dollar or two more, but that's not that big of a deal for me. As mentioned, had the CD been available for purchase at his site last month I would've bought from him directly.

Apparently the official press release surrounding the upcoming CD is that it's a return to classic Ray Stevens comedy. There's a reference made about this CD being his first all-comedy CD in nearly 10 years. In a previous blog entry I speculated that the CD being referenced in those press releases must be 2008's Hurricane or 2009's One for the Road. Those 2 projects, in particular, are heavy on re-recordings but they do contain some comical original recordings, too.

The projects (studio albums) that Ray's released on CD since 2000 are listed below...

1. Ear Candy; 2000 Clyde Records (concert favorite "Safe at Home" originated on this CD).

2. Osama Yo' Mama: The Album; 2002 Curb Records (features most of the recordings from Ear Candy along side several then-recent recordings: "Osama Yo' Mama", "United We Stand", and "Freudian Slip").

3. Thank You; 2004 Clyde Records (an all-serious CD containing mostly patriotic songs but some love ballads, too).

4. New Orleans Moon; 2007 Clyde Records (fabulous collection of songs rich in Louisiana culture; some of the titles include "Louisiana", "Do You Know What It Means to Miss New Orleans?", "New Orleans", "Basin Street Blues", and others; the title track was written by Ray and Chuck Redden; Chuck had supplied Ray with a song in 2005 called "The New Battle of New Orleans" which, in case you hadn't heard the original by Redden, it received some heavy re-writes by Ray and Buddy Kalb prior to Ray's recording of it; but more about Chuck later on).

5. Ray Stevens Sings Sinatra...Say What???; 2008 Clyde Records (the title says it all...he covers such Sinatra classics as "Strangers in the Night", "Witchcraft", "Young at Heart", "High Hopes", and more!; Ray, inexplicably, never promoted this CD and I don't recall ever seeing him on any television program singing any of the songs on the CD, neither!).

6. Hurricane; 2008 Clyde Records (this collection has a heavy redneck theme throughout...featuring titles such as "Hey Bubba, Watch This!", "Bubba the Wine Connoisseur", "Down Home Beach", "The Cure", and several re-recordings of songs Ray originally recorded in the mid 1980s; the title track spoofs the style of reporting on CNN and features Ray vocally playing the part of several high profile caricatures of public figures such as Wolf Blitzer, Christiana Amanpour, and a Jamaican reporter named Reggae Dreadlocks; Ray does a Ross Perot impression on "Sucking Sound").

7. One for the Road; 2009 Clyde Records (Sold exclusively at Pilot truck stops for several months...gained wider distribution in the latter half of 2009; It features several trucker songs but mostly the collection features re-recordings of songs plus 2 recordings Ray did for his 2000 CD, Ear Candy; Original recordings included on this CD are "Hang Up and Drive" and "Bon Temps Roulette", from 2000...plus the songs exclusive to this collection: "The Right Reverend Roadhog McGraw", "Hangin' Around", "Cooter Brown", "Retired", "Never Too Late", the emotional "Concrete Sailor", and he covers the CB classic "Convoy").

8. Ray Stevens Christmas; 2009 Clyde Records (this collection features non-comical Christmas songs and is often sold along side his 1997 comical holiday CD, Christmas Through a Different Window, during the Christmas season; the 2009 CD contains the original composition "Deck The Halls with Tear Drops" while the rest of the CD features his versions of Christmas classics).

9. We The People; 2010 Clyde Records (this 22 song project contains a treasure trove of recordings that range from never before available to previously released plus a couple of re-recordings added in; the project established Ray as a political entertainer/comedian; the re-recordings are "If 10 Percent is Good Enough for Jesus", "Kings and Queens", and a live recording of "Mr. Businessman"; previously released tracks come from 2000's Ear Candy, 2004's Thank You, and 2008's Hurricane; the songs making their debut on this project include political and topical recordings such as "Obama Nation", "The Fallen Ones", "Fly Over Country", "Come to the U.S.A.", "The Global Warming Song", "We Are the Government", "Throw the Bums Out!", "Caribou Barbie", "Three Fractured Factions", "Dear Andy Griffith", "Solar Powered Song", and "Midnight in Baghdad"; Ray also recorded his reading of the "Pledge of Allegiance" and his take on "The Star Spangled Banner"; the title track debuted late in 2009 via a music video on YouTube...from there it made it's way onto a commercially released single in early 2010...and the continued success of the music video led to this 22 song project; Chuck Redden provided "Midnight in Baghdad" while Max T. Barnes supplied several of the songs that went on to become YouTube music video successes for Ray).

10. Spirit of '76; 2011 Clyde Records (this 11 song CD is the follow-up to the 22 song project from 2010; it features "The Skies Just Ain't Friendly Anymore", "Obama Budget Plan", "Grandpa Voted Democrat", "Mr. President - Mr. President", and "God Save Arizona"; each of those songs have become YouTube music video successes; Ray, Buddy Kalb, and Chuck Redden wrote the optimistic, topical "November Storm").

11. The Encyclopedia of Recorded Comedy Music; 2012 Clyde Records (this mammoth project features Ray's versions of classic novelty songs and it sprinkles in a generous dose of his own latter day comedy recordings from recent projects including re-recordings of his classic hits that surfaced originally as far back as 1991...those particular early '90s re-recordings served as audio for his music videos on Comedy Video Classics; this 2012 project features a booklet complete with Ray's personal thoughts on every song contained on the box set...more than 100 altogether; Ray recorded the bulk of the songs over a 2 year period).

12. Ray Stevens Gospel Collection, Volume One; 2014 Gaither Music Group, Clyde Records (for this project, Ray covers several Gospel standards and tops it off with the original "If Jesus is a Stranger" from the pen of Don Cusic; In the early stages of the CD apparently the title was going to be Onward, Christian Soldiers but somewhere along the way the title changed; Ray appeared on several Gospel-Country programs to promote the CD).

13. Here We Go Again!; 2015 Player Records/ Sony RED (this is the upcoming CD...set for release on March 23rd; it features 12 songs in total and the first single release, in case you've been living in seclusion for several weeks, is "Taylor Swift is Stalkin' Me"...a current hit music video on YouTube the song was written by Ray, Buddy Kalb, and Chuck Redden; the trio also wrote another song on the CD, "You Didn't Build That", and I hope it becomes his next music video!).

In the mean time, here's the current music video...