Ray Stevens: "Gas" at 10.1K...

In all of the discussion on this blog centering around Ray's 4-CD box set and the music contained on it let us not forget about "Gas". I hadn't forgotten about it...a blog entry I posted back on July 26th focused on the audio track reaching 10,000 plays. "Gas", as you could probably imagine in case you hadn't heard it yet, is a novelty song. The comedy album it's scheduled to appear on isn't going to be released until October, according to an e-mail newsletter I'm signed up to receive, and so to release "Gas" four months ahead of the album has me thinking that maybe there will be an additional comedy song that'll surface within the next month or so just prior to the October release. However, they may just let "Gas" remain the only single-release until the comedy album comes along in October. 

In the last 5 days "Gas" has received 141 organic unique views to raise it's YouTube play from 10,002 to 10,143. Now, keep in mind, these unique views for "Gas" have been received with no heavy publicity for the song's availability. Now, outside of a few mentions of the song on Ray's social media last month and it's presence on several online music stores, it's racked up more than 10,000 YouTube plays based on organic discovery (a process described as a person intentionally searching for and watching video content on their own). I've been chronicling the YouTube plays of "Gas" since it made it's debut on June 3rd...and I'll continue to keep you all updated on it's YouTube performance from time to time. As long as it continues to rack up play in a notable manner I'll continue with the updates. As always feel free to share the audio with your online friends/family.

Ray Stevens: Country Music Hall of Fame coverage...

Hello once again!! There's been a lot of on-line coverage of Sunday night's Medallion Ceremony with photo's and sound-bytes...some of the websites I visited over the last few hours gave my computer fits and so I'm hesitant to share those links. Ray posted numerous photo's on his social media sites from the weekend...originally I was going to wait until photo's arrived from the Hall of Fame staff but considering one of the newest members, Ray Stevens, has shared photo's from the ceremony then I'll share some of those in this blog entry. Yes, I'm always hesitant to share things unless they've officially been released...and the photo's that were posted on-line the other day weren't necessarily from Ray's social media sites or from the Country Music Hall of Fame website and so I didn't share them...except a teaser...but now I'll post more...but first...

This is an article posted on television station WXIA in Atlanta, Georgia. You can read the article by clicking HERE. The same article was also posted on this news site found HERE. The Country Note website posted an article highlighting Ray's induction including a photo of Ray, Kyle Young, and Ralph Emery. It was Ralph who presented Ray with the medallion at the ceremony. In the realm of country music one of the biggest supporters of Ray's happened to be Ralph Emery and it was clearly an emotional day as the photo's that have surfaced on-line shown. If I'm not mistaken Ray made appearances on just about every radio and television program Ralph presided over...and Ralph has often shown up for various events that Ray presided over. You can read that article by clicking HERE. I left a comment over there...it's pending 'approval' and so it hasn't appeared on their site yet. I'm sure it'll be published and so in the coming hours or days when this blog entry is visited and you click the above link you should be able to see my comment. I also encourage anyone else to leave comments showing your support of Ray's music and career.

Those are just three websites that I chose to highlight...there are plenty more that reported on the events that took place on Sunday. A lot of the websites offer the same text, actually...but some websites have better reception than other sites...and so I decided to provide a link to the same article but on different websites. On Ray's official website they provided the text from the article that appeared in The Tennessean...the site that gave my computer a lot of fits earlier this morning. Thankfully the text from the site is now on Ray's official website and you can read the article by clicking HERE. The report found in the Tennessean had the most detail although any publicity for the event is certainly welcome.

Ray Stevens: 10-20-19

Here is another photo from the medallion ceremony at the Country Music Hall of Fame this past Sunday. I've captioned these photo's with their date. The election of Ray Stevens into the Country Music Hall of Fame was announced March 18, 2019 and the induction of Ray Stevens into the Country Music Hall of Fame happened October 20, 2019. As noted already I haven't heard or read a transcript of Ray's entire acceptance speech...I've only seen and heard bits and pieces. One of the things that Ray said in his speech was referencing his years playing sock hops in gym's throughout the southern Georgia area. In the earliest parts of my mini-blog series centering around Ray's upcoming induction I mentioned several key figures in his career: Chet Atkins, Ralph Emery, Andy Williams, and Bill Lowery. There are plenty of others, too: Mike Sheppard, Don Light, Shelby Singleton, Fred Foster, Jerry Kennedy...and numerous others. Andy's brother, Don, was a manger of Ray's for many years. As a session musician Ray worked with hundreds of musicians...in addition to that he often was a music arranger during those sessions and I'd read articles in which Ray was referred to as a session leader. There are dozens upon dozens of untold stories out there relating to recording sessions of yesteryear. Ray's pretty much seen it all...and he still has a hearty appetite to continue making music and entertaining...and this is evident in his CabaRay performances. Now, in addition to the photo's from the Medallion Ceremony, there have been photo's posted from Ray's own celebration with family. There's a photo showing Ray, his wife, their daughters, and grandchildren...and there is also a photo of Ray and his wife inside the Country Music Hall of Fame standing near Ray's plaque.

Ray Stevens: 10-20-19

Ray Stevens proudly shows his plaque inside the Country Music Hall of Fame. His gold medallion is partially concealed. The newly inducted members have their plaque's on prominent display inside the Hall of Fame before they're added to the rotunda along side the rest of the plaques. The plaque shown next to Ray is the one for record producer/executive, Jerry Bradley. In the background is the mural that should be familiar by now. The March 18, 2019 press conference took place revealing the newest member's of the Country Music Hall of Fame in front of that mural.

What we have below is a performance from Ray Stevens going back to 1979. The clip appeared on a 1984 television special hosted by Jim Stafford and Tanya Tucker titled Concert of the Stars. However, that special was a clip-fest which included performances from various country artists from selected past television appearances interspersed with newly recorded footage from the show's hosts. So, it's a 1984 television special but it featured clips from the past. The clip shown of Ray has him singing a medley of songs: "Turn Your Radio On", "Beautiful", "You Are So Beautiful", "Everything is Beautiful", and "America the Beautiful". If you're familiar with the clip of Ray performing "I Need Your Help, Barry Manilow", well, that performance is from a 1979 television special hosted by Jerry Reed called Nashville Salutes America. Ray is shown in the same wardrobe, playing with the same musicians, and on the same stage in this medley, too. Although it's credited to a 1984 television special the footage is actually from 1979...

Ray Stevens and a Touch of Silver...

Can it be? It's been 25 years since the release of this comedy album from Ray Stevens? Technically the album hit the stores on June 18, 1991 but I've never actually celebrated album or song milestones on the exact dates...I've only concentrated on the year and that makes 2016 the Silver Anniversary of #1 With a Bullet. This particular release, on Curb/Capitol Records, features the standard 10 songs but the thing that makes this particular project a bit different is that none of the songs were written or co-written by Ray Stevens. Oh, it's definitely a Ray Stevens album to be sure. He's still the producer, arranger, and one of the session musicians (playing piano and synthesizer) but the album was pretty much written by Ray's longtime collaborator, Buddy Kalb (all but one song is credited to Buddy either as sole writer or co-writer). The album, overall, presents a pop-culture mixture of novelty songs...a theme not found on many of Ray's previous series of novelty albums. The first three tracks on the album use current trends for humor. The opener, "Power Tools", is a comical story about a Do-It-Yourself amateur enthralled with the concept of power tools to the point where he fails to realize that although a power tool can make a job go by faster the less you know about the specific tool the more dangerous power tools can be. America seemed to have a love affair with the Do-It-Yourself types...and I should point out that this album was released several months before ABC television debuted the sitcom, Home Improvement, starring Tim Allen.

Track 2 on this album, "Teenage Mutant Kung Fu Chickens"...well, the title is a giveaway...it's a spoof of the animated series, Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles, which aired in traditional animated form in the late '80s and into the mid '90s. The turtles become a phenomenon launching movies, action figures, cereal, and comic books. In Ray's recording he sings of a chicken farm in Tennessee in which nuclear water leaked into a chicken coop. Once the eggs hatched the farmer discovered that the four chickens had extreme power and amazing self-defense skills. He named them appropriately: Fricassee, Cordon Blu, Cacciatory, and Stew. For track three the subject shifts to a current trend in country music by 1991 and it happened to be the Hat Act phenomena. "You Gotta Have a Hat" explores the fact that a lot of country music's mega-stars and sex symbols all wore Stetson hats. Ray sang about his plan to become a country music sex symbol by putting on a cowboy hat and driving around Nashville in a fancy car. It's a song that exaggerates the Hat Act trend and comically suggests that all you need to be a success in country music is to wear a hat. During concert performances of the song he'd add some visual comedy to the proceedings by pulling out a gigantic foam hat and wearing it during the performance.

"Tabloid News" is a frenetic performance detailing the big news making the headlines in the fictional National Supermarket Checkout Examiner. It's a funny song and one that gives Ray a lot of opportunity to spotlight his vocal talents and mimicry. Also a treat are the sound effects. "The Sheik of R and B" enables Ray to honor his love for classic rhythm and blues stylists and at the same time the title is a pun on the classic movie, The Sheik of Araby.

"Juanita and the Kids" debuted on this album...a lot of latter day fans of Ray Stevens, specifically those that discovered him by way of YouTube, may only be familiar with the music video. The video was first made available in 2000 and uploaded to YouTube in 2011 but the actual song goes back to this 1991 album. YouTube, obviously, has allowed Ray's catalog of recordings to live on in music video form. The song is about the IRS and in their zeal to audit a taxpayer and potentially collect some money fail to realize that this particular taxpayer has some mental issues...but more troubling is the fact that the IRS and other branches of the Federal Government issued his spouse and children social security cards and legal documents as a formality rather than realizing the kind of spouse and children he actually claims. If you hadn't heard the song I'm not going to mention the convoluted scenario any further. It's something you'll just have to hear for yourselves.

Something that was perhaps intentional or extremely coincidental is the fact that the album's final two songs make mention of Pearl Harbor and the Japanese. 1991 happened to be the 50th anniversary of the Pearl Harbor attack.

In "A Little Blue-Haired Lady" Ray sings about the all too common situation of being behind a really slow driver...her maximum speed being 20 miles per hour on an Interstate. Midway through the song there's mention of Roosevelt and the Japanese Ambassador in the aftermath of Pearl Harbor. The Japanese official said that they tried to give warning but...well, you know...

In the closing performance there's the one song that Buddy Kalb didn't have a hand at writing: "Working For the Japanese". In this wonderful song Ray tackles the subject of economics and the trend in U.S. economics at the time. An argument is made that there's too much dependence on foreign products and it's causing America's jobs to be shipped overseas. It's a timeless message but the message often falls on deaf ears because 25 years later the result of foreign product manufacturing has virtually eliminated manual labor in the United States. The song's writer happens to be Ron DeLacy.

#1 With a Bullet got a re-issue on CD in 2005. A lot of on-line retail stores and information sites fail to mention that the CD has an original copyright of 1991 and that it originally was issued on cassette tape. The on-line sites make it appear as if the songs had been recorded in 2005 by not pointing out that the material is actually from 1991. I skipped over a couple of songs on this CD, if you're keeping count, because I didn't want the blog entry to become a more extremely lengthy overview than it already has.

Ray Stevens: Rayality TV webisode 34...

Once again it's time to take a look at Rayality TV...the 34th installment debuted this past Friday. The clip is from one of Ray's concert DVDs and it's a performance of "It's Me Again, Margaret". If you consider yourself a fan of Ray Stevens at all then you should already be very familiar with this song and, like a lot of his stage performances, you'll be hooked from the beginning. Ray knows how to perform on stage and to deliver every drop of visual comedy into a performance.

This is one of his all-time classics.

Margaret is just one of the various female characters that have become embedded into the collective memories of every Ray Stevens fan. Aside from Margaret we've heard Ray sing about Fatima, obviously, in the 1962 classic "Ahab the Arab". Fatima, a member of the Sultan's harem, is carrying on with Ahab. Most critics, if not all, usually (or deliberately) forget that it's a comical cheating song and it brings scorn and contempt from hypersensitive, politically correct zealots. In my opinion the song's cleverness of blending and mixing various fictional titles together and presenting it in a pop music recording is certainly praise-worthy, fictional stories such as Ali Baba and the 40 Thieves, The Thief of Baghdad, The Sheik, The Son of the Sheik...each of those classic stories/films inspired Ray.

In the official music video of "Ahab the Arab" (filmed in 1995), Ray pays homage to the Valentino films, appearing several times in brief silent-movie type footage. It's very noticeable so be on the lookout for it.



Ray's single became a hit in the summer months of 1962. In December that year a brand new movie premiered...titled Lawrence of Arabia. I'm certain that the movie's box-office popularity throughout the early half of 1963 had unexpectedly kept Ray's novelty single as a radio recurrent long after it's original peak in 1962. Ray's single sold more than a million copies...I'd have to say that the sales strength came from much more than airplay exposure alone.

In the 1969 hits "Gitarzan" and "Along Came Jones", Ray told us about Jane and Sweet Sue, respectively. Jane attempted to be the singer in the jungle band...but her mate's overly anxious performances got on her nerves so much she screamed out her catchphrase at the end of her contribution (you readers should know that catchphrase!!). "Gitarzan" sold a million copies. Here's Ray as "Gitarzan" on the picture sleeve that accompanied the 1969 vinyl single...

Sweet Sue, on the other hand, is the classic damsel in distress type...always put in danger but rescued in the nick of time by Jones. Neither participant in "Along Came Jones" have any aspirations of being a singing sensation, though. A Gitarzan album appeared in 1969. A year later Ray had himself another hit comedy recording featuring a fictional female character...can you guess the name of it? If you said Bridget you're absolutely correct!!

"Bridget the Midget" became a international hit in late 1970/early 1971. The biggest success happened to occur in the United Kingdom. The song tells the story of a fictional tap dancer named Bridget and her back-up group, Strawberry and the Short-Cakes. The hook/gimmick of the novelty song is the sped-up vocalization of Bridget. Ray, in his natural voice, acts as presenter/narrator and at several moments in the recording there's an appearance of a spaced out beatnik/hippie-type patron that offers his enthusiasm about the goings-on.

The most popular female character in a Ray Stevens recording is a 3-way tie, actually. One of those is the previously mentioned Margaret from "It's Me Again, Margaret". The second of the three is Sister Bertha from "The Mississippi Squirrel Revival". That song and the one about Margaret both arrived back-to-back on a 1984 comedy album from Ray called He Thinks He's Ray Stevens (a Platinum selling, Top-5 Album on the country charts). Sister Bertha is the unfortunate soul that had a peculiar thing happen to her during church service.

Sister Bertha wasn't the first religious fictional female character to appear in a Ray Stevens recording. Four years earlier, in 1980, Sister Doris and Sister Dewdrop debuted on "The Dooright Family". Their duty was to sing harmony and bless the hearts of all they see. That song, made into a music video in 1995, debuted on Ray's 1980 Shriner's Convention album.

The third female character in the 3-way tie is none other than Ethel...the legendary wife of the eyewitness of "The Streak", in 1974. She comes in at #1 in the 3-way tie...the reason being is her name is synonymous with streaking thanks to the song's catchphrase heard at various moments, "don't look Ethel!!!". Another reason she's first in the 3-way tie at #1 is because "The Streak" sold more than 5 million copies internationally and because of the comical twist and the end of the song regarding Ethel's future.

Here are some other female characters that have popped up or have been mentioned in numerous recordings from Ray Stevens through the decades...

Sally Smash (pop vocalist in "The Rock and Roll Show", 1962); Sugar Bee (companion of motorcyclist "Speed Ball", 1963);  Heidi Fokes (girlfriend of "Butch Babarian", 1964); Bubble Gum (the lead character in "Bubble Gum the Bubble Dancer", 1964); Mary (title character in "Mary, My Secretary", 1967); Fair Maiden/Damsel (victim in "Sir Thanks-a-Lot", 1969); Mildred Queen (pop vocalist in "The Moonlight Special", 1974); Rita (title character in "Rita's Letter", 1980); Melissa (title character in "Melissa", 1981); Mary Lou Picket (from "Country Boy, Country Club Girl", 1982).

I'll stop there or I'll find myself mentally recalling every studio album from Ray Stevens starting in 1983 and moving forward...thinking of each and every mention of a female's name in a song or in the title of a song and so I'll stop there...but the characters above make up a good enough list.  

Ray Stevens on Hee-Haw, Part 7!!!!!!!

I certainly hope some of you all seen Sunday night's episode of Hee Haw on RFD-TV! It featured the one and only Ray Stevens as a special guest. The episode originated in October 1975, the fifth episode of the 1975-1976 television season. In a word, Ray was at his usual excellence!! His first performance of the night happened to be "Indian Love Call". Now, if you're familiar with Ray's version of that song and if you're familiar with the amazing performance he did on Pop! Goes the Country the same year then you should have been even more thrilled that he performed the song standing up...minus the confinement of the piano. Ray sang like a man possessed...full of energy and very animated as he sang the difficult number. I feel the absence of a piano allowed him to 'perform the song' but don't get me wrong...the performance on Pop! Goes the Country is just as incredible, vocally. Ray's attire on Hee Haw was similar to his attire on Pop! Goes the Country...a cream colored shirt and blue jeans.

Throughout the episode Ray appeared in a series of comical pop-up scenes, often accompanied by a thick cloud of smoke, begging to perform "Misty". In one scene Ray did his Gabby Hayes impression and recited a brief parody of "Where Do I Begin?". Ralph had also asked him to do that routine on Pop! Goes the Country.

Ray's second performance...of course, "Misty"!!! Throughout the program, as mentioned, Ray appeared in brief segments promoting the song and it's eventual performance. The actual performance, like "Indian Love Call", didn't feature him at the piano. In a sight gag, when Ray gets to the part where he sings "and a thousand violins begin to play", Ray looks around in the air several times as if to ask "where's that music coming from?". The band wasn't on camera. He may have been using a click track. In this performance he changed shirts and wore a white shirt with dashes of blue...it looked almost like the shirt he's wearing on his 1973 Nashville album...but minus the stars.

To answer the question on everyone's mind...the answer is a loud YES...Ray Stevens did have a beard during this 1975 appearance. The episode, as mentioned, originally aired in October of 1975. This means that the performances had been taped in the summer of that year. Hee Haw had a unique production cycle: a summer taping period and a fall taping period. The summer segments would be edited together to make up 13 episodes and then the fall segments would be edited together to make up 13 additional episodes (those fall produced episodes started airing early the following calendar year, the summer produced episodes are what kicked off each fall season). So, yes, an entire 26 episode season was built around 2 production periods a year.

Unfortunately RFD isn't airing Hee Haw on Monday morning anymore. It used to be a person could catch the 8pm Sunday night airing and then, if you chose, catch the replay of the program Monday morning at 10am but for the last several weeks it hasn't aired on Monday mornings. Hopefully someone will upload the episode onto You Tube...if not then those that missed it will have to wait awhile before it re-airs on RFD-TV. The channel airs a full season, then reruns those episodes, and then moves on to the next season. If I see any clips of Ray from this episode appear on You Tube I'll embed the clips in a future blog entry.

Ray Stevens: Golden LP Series, Part 28...

Once again welcome to the Golden LP Series! This time we take a look at studio album 28 in the career of Ray Stevens. This particular release hit in 1991 and it could easily be described as songwriter Buddy Kalb's magnum opus. Kalb wrote or co-wrote 9 of the 10 songs on here. This wasn't the first Ray Stevens project that featured an abundance of Kalb material. He'd been writing songs for and with Ray on a consistent basis since the early '80s. Each successive LP that Ray issued throughout the '80s would usually include at least 4 songs from the pen of Buddy Kalb...often in collaboration with Ray. Their magnum opus on vinyl as a songwriting team was studio album 26 in 1989. That particular album was largely written by Ray and Buddy but this 1991 release is the first time that Buddy was the sole writer on just about every song.

The 28th studio album was titled #1 With a Bullet. This title is based on music industry jargon that a general audience may not be familiar with. In the music business there are weekly charts that rank albums and songs based on sales and airplay. Whenever a single or an album shown an increase in sales or airplay it receives what's referred to as a bullet. If you look at any weekly music chart you'll see numbers that appear on a black dot on certain singles and albums. Those are the releases that have been given bullets to indicate that the release is 'hot' and is a 'fast mover', etc. etc. just like a real bullet from a gun. When a single is said to have gone #1 With a Bullet that means the single is incredibly hot and shows no signs of losing steam for a couple of weeks even though it can no go higher than #1. The same applies to albums as well. The phrase "with a bullet" simply indicates that a song or album is selling briskly or has a good opening week on the charts. However, this doesn't mean that an artist must reach the charts in order to show their popularity. All artists have their initial across the board successes but ultimately what happens over the course of time is an artist begins to focus on their fan-base and what might please a targeted audience rather than a general audience.

As far as this album goes it's a return to zaniness and nuttiness. In the early years of the macho do-it-yourself kind of men we have the perfect song addressing the situation in "Power Tools". In this song, one of the single releases, Ray sings about the utter chaos and destruction that happens as a result of his messing with stuff he shouldn't be messing with. It's a good way to open up an album filled with zany goings-on. The song reached the Country Singles chart early in 1992 as an album cut. There wasn't a commercial single available for purchase.

In a song that was inspired by a Saturday morning cartoon series we have "Teenage Mutant Kung Fu Chickens". Spoofing the Ninja turtles, Ray's song tells about a chicken foursome and their heroics on the farm. Ray showcases his elderly lady impression as well as a gruff vocalization as a shady con-artist who tells a story of a peculiar rooster on the farm. When Ray guest hosted Nashville Now in the latter part of 1990 or early 1991 he performed a song about the trend in country music where all the men were wearing cowboy hats. New artists that were popping up were wearing hats. In "You Gotta Have a Hat" Ray whimsically informs us that the only thing it takes to become rich and successful in country music is a hat. Ray's impression skills and overall mimicry brilliance is once again on display in "Tabloid News" where we hear about the outrageous headlines and get to hear first hand accounts by those people written about in the made up stories. One of the stories is about a woman who gives birth to an alien. We get to hear her gush and show emphatic approval of his mistakes. "The Sheik of R&B" is a pun on the movie title Sheik of Araby. In Ray's song we hear about an arab who loves the sounds of classic R&B. He'd discovered it by accident while in the vicinity of an American soldier's army tent. "Juanita and the Kids" is a satire on the IRS and taxes in general. In the original recording Ray performs the song in his natural voice but several years later, when a music video was made, he re-recorded the song with an exaggerated Americanized Spanish-Mexican accent. Ray offers a re-recording of "The Pirate Song", track five.

"A Little Blue Haired Lady", track 9, is a comical story about the frustrations motorists experience while being stuck behind a driver going 20 mph in a 65 mph zone. An interesting tidbit of information you may not realize is little blue haired ladies played a factor in the hours leading up to the Pearl Harbor attack. How? You'll have to listen to the song to find out! Pearl Harbor's 50th Anniversary was marked in 1991. How ironic, though, that the 1991 album would close with the social commentary of "Working For the Japanese". This is an incredible song and it was the first single release in the latter part of 1991. It was a topical song about the economy and how America consumes more and more products from overseas rather than our own products. A gong was a prominent instrument in the recording as were the vocal impressions of Geisha girls cooing and sighing in the background. The single was showing some signs of gaining traction with country radio...it reached the Country Singles chart, too. This was his first appearance on the weekly singles chart since 1988. However, political correctness was becoming an ever increasing nuisance in society. The success of the song was halted by the politically correct advocates who threatened anyone and everything that shown the slightest support of the song. As a result of a potential protest/boycott, radio stations one by one started to pull the song from their playlists. In the meantime, advertisers didn't want the song played on stations that their ads aired on for fear of a backlash of some sort. The single was nearing the Top-50 on the Country Singles chart when it was pulled from the airwaves.

1991 is the year that Ray Stevens opened up his much anticipated theater in Branson, Missouri. The facility was one of the most popular for a period of years. Ray's years in Branson, Missouri saw an obvious decrease in his road dates as well as a decrease in television show appearances. The following year would launch a new creative avenue for Ray and one that caused a steady decrease in his audio releases as more and more of his attention was being taken up by his successful theater and a phenomenal music video collection released exclusively through mail-order. As mentioned in a previous blog entry, the more we progress into the 1990's the more we see a creatively restless artist having the time of his life with music video production and marketing.

Ray Stevens: Obama Nation, Part 6...

Good Wednesday morning! "Obama Nation" continues to be a success...it's gotten over 310,000 views in a little more than 2 weeks time. Of course, for me, the next major plateau is for the video to cross into half a million territory! Based on the fact that it's already in the 300,000+ range, I feel the video will surpass the 500,000 mark rather quickly. The video has the makings of being one of his million-viewing successes. 

While searching Facebook a few minutes ago I came across a link to a brand new interview with Ray Stevens. The interview is conducted by a duo known as Kim and Ken. There is an Interview Archive section at their web-site and so if you come across this blog entry several days or weeks from now and can't find Ray's interview in the link below then you will have click their Interview Archive link once you're at their site.

Kim and Ken Interview Ray Stevens 

The interview is upbeat most of the time, hilarious a lot of the time, but also serious and reflective when the discussion turn towards mortality and the losses of Andy Griffith and George Lindsey within the last couple of months. There's also discussion of political issues which offer a lot of opportunity to discuss You Tube, his music videos, and how humor works during harsh economic times.

Kim brings up Ray having a hit single from the 1970's in Bangkok. The single was "Love Lifted Me" in 1972...Ray had arranged the song in a rock and roll delivery and it reached the music charts in Bangkok. Ray doesn't recall having a hit over there given that he's never appeared there but I looked up the single that was confusing the three of them and sure enough it was a chart hit in Bangkok. It was ranked in that country's Top-30 list for the week ending October 7, 1972.

Here's a link showing the Billboard Hits of the World section from a Google book search I did. You can click the plus sign once there to increase the image's size. You'll see Ray's single listed in the Top-20. The countries are in alphabetical order starting with Argentina.

All Things Ray Stevens...

One of the various picture sleeves for the international smash hit from Ray Stevens in 1971 titled "Bridget the Midget". The single reached the Top-5 in the United Kingdom, the Top-5 in Belgium, the Top-5 in Holland, and the Top-50 on America's pop chart. As far as release months go it was issued in America first in December 1970. In January 1971 it hit in Holland and the following month it hit in Belgium. In March 1971 it hit in the United Kingdom. Political correctness pretty much keeps this song from getting much attention nowadays but it appeared on quite a few compilation albums released on Ray Stevens during the '70s, some of the '80s compilations, a few from the '90s, and just several in the next decade. As you can see, as the years went by, the less frequent the song remained in print and commercially available. It appears on the 1990 His All-Time Greatest Comic Hits release on Curb Records. It was on that collection where I first heard the song as it didn't appear on any of the compilations on Ray Stevens that I owned at the time. It later appeared on the Rhino Records collection, The Best of Ray Stevens, in 1997. In 2001 it was included on the Varese Sarabande CD titled All-Time Greatest Hits. He re-recorded the song several years later for a limited animation music video found on 2004's Cartoon Video Collection. The audio recording of that performance appears on the Box Set release from 2005.

"Can He Love You Half as Much as I?" is a Ray Stevens song from 1986 that he performed on several television program throughout 1986 and much of 1987. It was released as a commercial single in 1987 as the third release from Surely You Joust...following "The People's Court" and "Southern Air". The album's first two singles featured some heavy duty production work...more so on "Southern Air" but "The People's Court" has it's share, too. Jerry Clower and Minnie Pearl make guest appearances on "Southern Air"...as the Captain and the man-crazy Stewardess...Ray plays the part of the nervous passenger. The song opens up with Ray's vocal impression of a beat-up airplane trying to start and take off, which it eventually does.

"The People's Court" is a send-up of the television program of the same name (the original 1981-1993 version with Judge Wapner and company). In the recording Ray demonstrates his vocal mimicry of the nagging wife. The husband is the Plaintiff, the wife is the Defendant, and each one gets a chance to tell their side of the story to the Judge. Also on hand is the court reporter whose nameless in the recording. Interestingly the voice Ray uses as the reporter is more similar to the hushed delivery of Jim Peck from Divorce Court than the louder enunciations of Doug Llewelyn of The People's Court.

You can view his 1986 performance of "Can He Love You Half as Much as I?" by clicking this link: Can He Love You Half as Much as I?. The video uploader doesn't provide embed links and so I'm unable to post the actual video here. As a result you'll have to click the link and be taken to the video host's site, You Tube, and view it there. While there search for the performance Ray did of the song "Fat". It was uploaded by the same person. On Surely You Joust it's track 5.

As mentioned, the performance comes from 1986, right around the point in time when he began winning the Music City News Comedian of the Year trophy every year. As mentioned in earlier blog entries, Ray won this fan-voted award during 1986, 1987, 1988, 1989, 1990, 1991, 1992, 1993, and 1994. He was nominated for the award prior to 1986 and after 1994 but lost out to other performers. For the award program's last several years in existence the Comedian trophy went to traditional stand-up comics who had gained some attention/hype in the country music press for their blue collar/redneck material. The lone exception was Gary Chapman, a gospel-oriented performer whose comical monologues on the television program he hosted on The Nashville Network during the mid-late '90s, Primetime Country, created the opportunity for a nomination in the Comedian category.

As many long-time fans are aware, Ray Stevens became pretty much exclusive to comedy recordings in 1984 with the release of He Thinks He's Ray Stevens. The album would reach the Top-5 on the Country Album chart in 1985 and eventually sell more than a million copies. The 1985 follow-up, I Have Returned, would hit #1 and sell half a million copies. Ray didn't put a non-comical recording on any of his next series of albums, which included the years of 1986, 1987, and 1988. It wouldn't be until 1989, with the release of Beside Myself, that new non-comical songs emerged on a Ray Stevens album. After this release he returned to country comedy full-time and eventually added home video superstar to his list of accomplishments. The period of 1992 through 1997 saw Ray Stevens sell millions of VHS home videos. During this same era, 1991-1993, Ray owned and performed at his self-named Branson, Missouri theater. Ray would return to Branson many times in the years following the closing of his theater. He's scheduled to appear in Branson later this year at Andy Williams' theater. His own theater, which was closed from 1993 through 2004, reopened for another stretch of concert performances from Ray before he sold it to RFD-TV.

Nowadays, for those who aren't aware, Ray is involved in political humor from a conservative point of view. Conservative humorists are a rare thing...most political humor, both past and present, has almost exclusively centered around poking fun at a conservative philosophy or trashing a prominent figure in Republican politics. It's still very seldom that liberal philosophies get the satirical treatment...even less frequent is the spoofing of left-wing progressive viewpoints...and even more less frequent is any positive publicity from the mainstream media for what few conservative humorists still exist. Ray Stevens, since December 2009, has become affiliated with conservative humor...some of the songs he's released since then are light-hearted and whimsical while others are straight to the point and serious. His songs have become hits on-line through music video exposure on You Tube...and it's that exposure on You Tube and numerous high-profile appearances on a variety of programs on the Fox News Channel that introduced Ray to a new audience and re-introduced him to a mainstream pop audience again.

In my opinion the conservative humor in the music videos caught a lot of people by surprise and for a lot of people who never heard of Ray Stevens before, based upon their comments, they didn't really know what to make of the humor. The reason being is a lot of the people who frequent You Tube are much more familiar with videos that make fun of conservatives on a routine basis. I imagine a lot of people who watched "We The People" and never knew of Ray beforehand perhaps asked themselves: "Who is this Ray Stevens guy??? And why is he putting down Obama??". Since then he's released several political music videos and from time to time appears on the Fox News Channel and the Fox Business Channel. He's released two albums of political comedy. We The People hit in 2010 and Spirit of '76 hit in 2011. As most of the readers of this blog know Ray will be releasing a 9-CD collection later this month called The Encyclopedia of Recorded Comedy Music. The project will not be politically themed as his previous two collections were and with so much material I suspect that Ray will promote and market this collection throughout much of 2012 and beyond. It's anyone's guess if he'll put out a new political music video by the time the 2012 Election rolls around in November. His channel on You Tube is called raystevensmusic in all lower case. It was created early in 2009.

Here's a re-cap of Ray's You Tube political and patriotic music video totals:

1. We The People; 2009 on-line views as of 2/5/2012: 4,652,576

2. Caribou Barbie; 2010 on-line views as of 2/5/2012: 481,298

3. Throw the Bums Out; 2010 on-line views as of 2/5/2012: 856,381

4. Come to the U.S.A.; 2010 on-line views as of 2/5/2012: 5,799,176

5. The Global Warming Song; 2010 on-line views as of 2/5/2010: 198,855

6. God Save Arizona; 2010 on-line views as of 2/5/2012: 841,723

7. The Skies Just Ain't Friendly Anymore; 2011 on-line views as of 2/5/2012: 277,289

8. Obama Budget Plan; 2011 on-line views as of 2/5/2012: 1,099,143

9. Mr. President - Mr. President; 2011 on-line views as of 2/5/2012: 474,304

Note: Two other music videos of a patriotic nature filmed before 2009 were uploaded onto You Tube by Ray. "Osama Yo' Mama" dates back to late 2001. The music video, uploaded onto You Tube in 2009, has 1,247,345 on-line views. "Thank You", the song and music video dating back to 2004, features additional video footage in the 2009 upload. As of 2/5/2012 the video has 420,795 views. Keep in mind that the 9 music videos listed above are only the ones that have a political/patriotic overtone. A few of his non-political music videos have obtained a million views: "The Streak" has 1,635,336 views and "The Mississippi Squirrel Revival" has 1,815,717 views. Those two music videos, uploaded in 2009, were filmed in 1992...well before You Tube came along.

Ray Stevens: Comedy Music Magnet, Part 3...

On this early Sunday morning I come with a link to nearly 170 pictures of Ray Stevens that were posted at the Imperial Palace's Facebook page. One picture in particular, the third picture in row 6, looks as if he's doing an impression of Groucho Marx. Comments are open to the public...even those who weren't able to appear.

Ray's next couple of concerts for 2011 will take place in Canada at the Scotia Bank Convention Center in Niagara Falls, Ontario, Canada. Ray appears at this venue on back to back days: November 28th and November 29th. His appearances are part of what's called the Winter Festival of Lights. Lorrie Morgan, based upon the venue's web-page, is a co-headliner but there's no information regarding whether or not the two will share the same stage or if in one concert Lorrie plays the part of the opening act and in another Ray returns the favor so it's difficult to determine how the concerts are going to be presented. Those who are planning on going to the concert can easily find out information by calling their number: 1-800-563-2557 or sending an e-mail to tickets@WFOL.com

Since the first concert is going to take place 8 days from now it would make more sense to call the venue directly using the number I supplied. You can also visit this link to see the information that I just wrote about. The venue seats 5,000 people so I'd not wait until the last minute to inquire about the concert.

Meanwhile, the following Imperial Palace Facebook link will take you to the pictures showing Ray on stage at various moments in the concert Saturday night.

Revisiting Ray Stevens, Part 13...

If one takes a look at Amazon's search results for Ray Stevens CD's you'll come across three CD releases that according to the information will be released in January 2012.

Everything Is Beautiful
Turn Your Radio On
Misty

The bizarre thing about these releases is that they feature the same picture of Ray Stevens...two of the CD's contain the exact same picture, color scheme, and lettering while a third CD just features the same picture of Ray. The picture comes from 1970 during a performance on a television program. I'd say it's from his 1970 summer TV show. The CD's are being released by a label known as Pazzazz Records. As of this writing there is no track listing available and so it's pretty difficult to dissect the CD's without knowing what's on them...the second time around. The one titled Everything Is Beautiful features 2 CD's while the other collections feature just 1 CD each.

The ironic thing is these collections were previously available several years ago. The CD titled Misty was originally released in 2006 and it featured 15 songs. I'm assuming that with the resurgence of Ray's mainstream popularity, thanks to 2009's "We The People" music video on You Tube, that Pazzazz is hoping to tap into an even larger audience than before!?

To further explain what I just wrote read the following...

Prior to 2009 it's safe to assume that only the devoted fans, the dedicated fans, and comedy music fans in general were purchasing Ray's products and going to his concerts.

You see this happening much more in country music than in pop music but once an artist gets established and builds a fan base it's pretty much set in stone that no matter what happens in the music industry and whether a singer is on the radio anymore or not it's always been a safe bet that the fans would continue to show support for their favorite artist well after the general public's moved on to someone else. So, not surprisingly, the last thing the general public knew of Ray Stevens prior to 2009 were his early and mid 1990's TV commercials for a string of music video projects and they also recalled his Branson, Missouri theater (which he performed in during 1991 through 1993 and again from 2004-2006). What that means is that the general public knew very little of Ray's contemporary happenings and many assumed he retired years ago or assumed he was not even among the living. A lot of people were far more familiar with his older recordings than they were his recent recordings. Keeping all that in mind...December 2009 rolls around and "We The People" hits You Tube. The song/video became known as 'Obama Care' by many people who discovered the video...even today bloggers refer to the song as 'Obama Care' instead of it's actual title.

Anyway, once the video became an on-line hit, hundreds upon hundreds of people were shocked and they started asking one another "is this the same Ray Stevens who did The Streak?? I thought he died!". As I mentioned several blogs ago many people actually thought Ray died years ago. Since so many people, judging by their on-line comments, hadn't kept up with Ray's career I've since started referring to the period of 1999-2009 as the lost decade. In some of the comments at You Tube several people mentioned that they hadn't heard much about Ray since the days of "The Streak" way back in 1974! Since those comments came in December 2009 it meant that 35 years had passed between the release of that song and "We The People". I found it hard to believe that people hadn't heard much about Ray in more than 30 years but yet that's what a lot of people were saying.

Obviously with the video being political and a protest against what amounts to Government run health care there have been a long list of critics (liberal-progressives) who belittled the song and it's fans and marginalized Ray Stevens and his fans. Since the release of the video Ray's become associated with the Tea Party and often performs at political fundraisers sponsored by Tea Party organizations. The political direction in his career took some people by surprise...a very few early on pulled the familiar "I've been a long time fan but..." routine...yet by and large Ray's fans had no animosity toward his decision to do political comedy. If truth be known, much of Ray's political feelings mirrored his fans' political beliefs, so I've always felt that the ones complaining about the political overtones in his music are either not interested in politics at all or they never were fans to begin with and are just saying they were to create a negative perception that they hoped would be spread around and accepted as reality.

Fast forwarding to 2011...and 20,000,000+ on-line views later...yes, you read that correctly...according to the stats at Ray's You Tube channel his total upload views are 20,408,237. This is the total of the number of on-line views of each of his music videos added together. Five of his videos have gotten at least 1,000,000 views while quite a few others have gotten half a million. The current view totals for the Top-10 Ray Stevens video uploads are as follows...

1. Come to the USA; 2010: 5,609,434 views
2. We The People; 2009: 4,573,905 views
3. Mississippi Squirrel Revival (1992); 2009: 1,521,109 views
4. The Streak (1992); 2009: 1,347,695 views
5. Osama Yo' Mama (2001); 2009: 1,192,006 views
6. Obama Budget Plan; 2011: 828,182 views
7. God Save Arizona; 2010: 819,238 views
8. Throw the Bums Out; 2010: 817,419 views
9. Caribou Barbie; 2010: 455,319 views
10. Thank You (2004); 2010: 411,598 views

...and the current video, at the moment, is ranked #14 among Ray's most-viewed uploads:

***14. Mr. President - Mr. President; 2011: 269,288 views***

Notice the numbers gap between video #9 and video #8. Ray's current video's only been on-line for 3 weeks and we'll see how high it rises in the days and weeks to come. His previous video is ranked #6.

He's Still Ray Stevens To Us!!

If I were super-talented I'd write a song called "He's Still Ray Stevens To Us" because that's what I often feel like saying anytime I come across a blog or read a comment left on some social network site that doesn't have positive or flattering words to say about Ray or his music. Now, due to my not having the patience or the discipline to write a song with such a title I decided to use that for the name of this latest blog entry. He's still Ray Stevens to us...the fans...those who appreciate the music, the laughs, the concerts, the TV and radio appearances he's done in his career. A big reason why I say he's still Ray Stevens to us is because there's some who've made commentary over the course of the last several years suggesting that Ray's somehow changed and isn't the same anymore. I happen to feel that Ray's the same...only difference is he's more vocal about topical issues now than he ever was. Who's to say that Ray never held these same views years ago? Who's to say the Ray Stevens of 1980 didn't hold a lot of the same economic and social views he does today? The only difference, as I said, is he's more vocal about his viewpoints now than he was then.

Does that make his music no good because he's decided to incorporate a political element to his recordings now? He's still Ray Stevens to us...he's still funny, he can still sing, he still produces and arranges his own albums which obviously shows that he's still heavily involved in the making of his records whereas most of his peers (the ones who are still recording) don't get that involved. All of these things the long-time, hardcore Ray Stevens fans already know...but that can't be said for those who really aren't long-time fans but pretend they are just to either stir up trouble or to, well, stir up trouble. It exists mostly on social media sites and occasionally it bleeds over onto places like Amazon, too, where quite a few customer reviews turn much more into artist bashing than a legitimate review...and you guessed it...most of the "bashing" takes place from those who position themselves as "long-time fans". I've read plenty of comments from 'long-time Ray Stevens fans' who didn't really know much about Ray at all beyond a couple of songs. So, because of those experiences and several others through the years, I continue to doubt people's sincerity when they use the "I've been a long-time fan..." routine. In my way of thinking you can't possibly be a "long-time fan" of anybody or anything and not know quite a lot about whatever or whoever you're a fan of. It defies the entire concept of being a fan if you know very little about a singer or an actor/actress or athlete that you profess to be a "long-time fan" of.

He's Still Ray Stevens to Us...and with the release of this 22 song CD in 2010 Ray Stevens cemented his new-found reputation as a political entertainer and the numbers speak for themselves. Two of his politically themed music videos have gotten more than 3 million on-line views. "Come to the U.S.A." satirizes the illegal immigration problem in America by sarcastically welcoming illegals to the country because once they get in they'll have a great ol' time. This particular music video has it's share of critics...it's a highly emotional topic...and so far it's gotten 5,463,343 on-line views. The video hit in the summer of 2010. "We The People", on the other hand, is the video that launched Ray's journey into political entertainment. The song emerged late in 2009 followed soon after by a music video. The song's lyrics deal with opposing Obama Care. The critics tried to marginalize the song and it's video but when that wasn't working they tried to make Ray out to be some sort of "right wing kook" and when that didn't work they finally moved on. Interestingly, when "Come to the U.S.A." was issued as a video the critics tried and tried to label Ray as a right-wing zealot but that accusation fell on deaf ear's too, just as it should. "We The People" so far has gotten 4,499,002 on-line views.

He's still Ray Stevens to us!! This is his most recent release...it's the Spirit of '76. The CD contains "God Save Arizona" in which the music video has gotten 792,233 on-line views which is quite amazing when you consider the video's uniquely topical in that it deals with the Federal Government's lawsuit of Arizona over it's illegal immigration policies. So it was more about a specific court action rather than something political...even though politics is never far away when it comes to these kinds of things. In my opinion the far-left political stance of the Attorney General and Obama ignited a lot of the turmoil for their out-right refusal to respect Arizona's law and I put the blame on those two for the drama that followed. For those who yet haven't heard the song it's a serious performance...it's not funny or remotely humorous. The song gives his serious side a chance to shine for one of the few times in a music video. Illegal immigration has always been a hot topic but among the mainstream media it became a top news story throughout much of the summer and early fall in 2010 and as a result this music video and "Come to the U.S.A." musically commented on the activity.

Elsewhere on the CD there's "The Skies Just Ain't Friendly Anymore" which also deals with a topic that was hot and seemingly on everyone's minds for a period of a couple of months but then the topic suddenly vanished. By that account it's a novelty song in the truest sense of the word! The song/video spoofs the TSA's airport security procedures. The video is quite comical and it takes some jabs at some political figures along the way. The video was going along great (earlier in the year) but then, as the topic started to fade from attention, the same thing happened with the video's impact as it currently sits just below the 200,000 mark in on-line views. The exact number is 199,857. He 'bounced back' with the following video aimed at the Federal budget. The "Obama Budget Plan" has gotten more than half a million on-line views so far...it's current total is 558,490. The video's been on-line since late April and so it's not like it's brand new but it's the most recent one he's uploaded. A lot of the reason why that video got much more on-line activity than the TSA song is because the budget and the deficit is something that affects everyone in some way or another. The economic/fiscal policies of the Obama Administration impact all Americans and the "Obama Budget Plan" humorously skewers the mishandling of the economy. On the other hand not everyone's had an experience with the TSA...and for some segments of the public the humorous song wasn't connecting with them as much.

Starting with 1957's "Silver Bracelet" and going through his most recent recordings in 2011 no matter what comes and goes and no matter which music style he's singing you're bound to be entertained by Ray Stevens. No matter what a hip music critic might say or what some far left political blogger might say, deep down, He's Still Ray Stevens To Us!!

Revisiting Ray Stevens, Part 5...

In the career of Ray Stevens 1979 is highlighted by one song in particular...a satirical spoof entitled "I Need Your Help, Barry Manilow". What you see is half of the lengths that the publicity department went to in their promotional campaign of Ray's song. The other half of the promotional campaign would feature an album on Ray in which the cover of the album would be another spoof of a Manilow release. The single was written by Dale Gonyea and it became a Top-50 pop hit in 1979 but it reached the Top-15 on the Adult-Contemporary lists. This is important to point out because the Adult-Contemporary format is where Barry was the airplay king...having a solid string of virtually uninterrupted Top-5 hits dating back to early 1975. Manilow's streak of Top-20 successes would continue on AC radio through 1986 but Ray's single came at a time (1979) when Manilow was reaching his peak on Top-40 pop radio even though he still had nearly 8 more years of AC success ahead of him. That's why it's so ironic that Ray's spoof of Manilow hit bigger on AC radio than on pop radio...you'd think the format that wasn't playing Manilow as much (pop) would've had a field day with "I Need Your Help, Barry Manilow" but instead the exact opposite occurred: favorable AC radio played the Manilow spoof.

The hit single spawned the album I earlier mentioned...the album was a compilation project built to support Ray's unexpected hit single. That album, The Feeling's Not Right Again, mocks the album design of Manilow's 1975 release, Tryin' To Get The Feeling. This 1979 single and the chicken clucking "In The Mood" from late 1976/early 1977 are the two recordings that Ray Stevens did for Warner Brothers that often get included on compilation projects. He had more hits for Warner Brothers than just those two releases but given that those two are in the comical/novelty vein probably explains why compilers single out those two recordings in particular. Most compilers like to spotlight his comical recordings more than the non-comical...but then again, some projects feature more non-comical selections than comical...it all depends, I guess, on which record company is putting the collections together and which audience they're aiming to attract.

Ray Stevens and the Spirit of '76, Part 7...

Good late Sunday night to all the Ray Stevens fans! In my previous blog entry I took a look at a lot of the music video projects that Ray's been a part of since 1992. My original entry several days ago that I published was rather short and so earlier today I edited in a lot more information and included some recent pictures of myself spotlighting some of my Ray Stevens items. Tonight's blog entry is built around spreading the word around that Ray will be heard on WSM radio on August 1st. I don't believe I'm speaking of this too soon...but keep in mind that appearances can be canceled or postponed at the last minute...so I'm often weary of spreading the word around too far in advance. As of now, Ray will be heard at some point during the Eddie Stubbs show on WSM radio August 1st. The time given is 7-9pm...by my guess this is Central time. Those who live in the Eastern time zone that means 8-10pm. There's not much information, at the moment, on just what all will take place on August 1st but I assume Ray will be interviewed in person given that the radio program will be broadcast from the Country Music Hall of Fame...and more than likely the topic of his new CD, Spirit of '76, will be brought up. Also, a few weeks later, Ray will speak at a Chet Atkins event...the event takes place at the Hall of Fame, too, on August 13th.

So, my guess is, Ray's appearance on Eddie's radio program on August 1st will create awareness for both the new CD and the upcoming Chet Atkins event. Eddie, in addition to hosting a 5 hour radio program on WSM Monday-Friday, is an Opry announcer, the announcer for the Marty Stuart Show on RFD-TV, and he also hosts a monthly radio series called Intimate Evenings and it, coincidentally, takes place at the Hall of Fame...with a small audience...so chances are Intimate Evenings is the 2 hour program Ray will be appearing on August 1st!!

If I find out anything else about August 1st I'll either write a new blog or edit this one. WSM streams on-line for those who can't pick up the station on the radio.

Ray's current music video, "Obama Budget Plan", continued to hover around the 380,000 range. At last glance the video's view count was 379,889. I look for Ray to debut a new music video in August or September. The "Obama Budget Plan" is a little over 2 months old but in the world of on-line video that's the equivalent to the average life span of a song on the country charts. The difference being that on the radio a song is played for several more weeks after it's reached it's peak...commonly referred to as a recurrent by that time...on an on-line video site this of course doesn't happen and so a new video has to surface to continue a hot streak for the artist. I'm hoping a few of the songs on the Spirit of '76 emerge as music videos...as I've often said I like the potential of "Mr. President - Mr. President" to easily reach half a million people. There's also "New Normal" and "News Machine". It would be surprising if Ray doesn't do anything with the "Mr. President" song but ultimately which songs become music videos is up to Ray...I'll like whatever he puts out. By this time next year we'll all be focused on the 2012 Elections!

Ray Stevens: 45 at 36...

The music recorded by Ray Stevens a year before I was born continues to remain some of my favorites of his career. Turning 36 this year are the recordings from 1975. "Misty" is the first song of his from 1975 that I heard. It's featured on his famous 1987 Greatest Hits release on MCA. How famous? Well, the collection became a Platinum seller...so it was pretty popular throughout the latter half of the '80s. At some point in the mid '90s I heard another of his 1975 hits for the first time...the inclusion of "Indian Love Call" on a 1991 Greatest Hits collection from Curb Records is where I heard his Doo-wop/R&B/soulful rendition of the pop standard for the first time. I've got clips of Ray singing "Indian Love Call" and "Misty" from a 1975 episode of Pop! Goes the Country. You've seen my posts about his performance but if not search the archives or Google the name of my blog along with the phrase "Pop! Goes the Country" and see what the search results find. Later in the year "Young Love" was released as a single as was "Lady of Spain". Ray slows down the pace dramatically in his rendition of "Young Love"...it comes off as a completely different song even though it's the same one performed, up-tempo, by Sonny James as well as Tab Hunter.

In each performance we're treated to Ray's unique arrangements as he turns decades old pop songs into contemporary recordings. "Lady of Spain", for example, carries a touch of Fats Domino in Ray's vocals. Ray goes all out in the recording and the arrangement is up-tempo and on the wild side and it's wonderful. Those who've never heard Ray's version you're in luck...remember a few years ago Collectable's Records issued several of his Barnaby releases onto CD and Mp3? Well, the Mp3's are still available on Amazon...and you can own your Mp3 version of the 1975 Misty album right here and hear all of those wonderful recordings for yourselves.

Ray Stevens and the TSA, Part 10...

This Sunday morning blog entry finds "The Skies Just Ain't Friendly Anymore" with 102,596 unique views. As of now there isn't any radio call-in's posted at Ray's web-site. Whenever there's a call-in they usually get posted in the Tour section simply because it's a radio call-in tour. It began in early February...actually, late January, right around the time the TSA song was still in it's infant stages as I call it. At that time there was no CD single, Mp3 single, or music video available...and in those earliest radio interviews he'd comment that the single would be available soon and that he was working on a music video. As we all know the commercial availability happened in early February as the CD and Mp3 single became available for purchase at Ray's web-site and at Amazon and Itunes. Following the commercial release the music video became available on February 17th.

Since the month of February has fewer days than the rest of the months of the year it enabled the calendar to flip over to March in a week and 4 days time. The time span that the music video's been available is 17 days. The only reason I break all of that down is because some people will see "February" as the video's release month, paying no attention to the actual upload date, and with it now being March there will no doubt be some out there who'll say the video's been out for "2 months" when in reality it's only been available on You Tube for a little over 2 weeks...and so it's still in the early stages. The music video won't be a month old until March 17th.

In the meantime, though, continue to be on the look out for The Spirit of '76. As soon as it becomes available I'll write a blog about it and as soon as I'm able to hear it I'll write a review. Although a lot of you could've guessed as much it never hurts to remind people. I'm currently in the process of writing a review of Ray's We The People album from last year. I have a review up on Amazon but this new review is at a different on-line store. I had noticed that an existing review at this other on-line store didn't really say a whole lot about the CD...and with a CD that contains 22 songs the review should at least have some length to it...and so I'm writing a brief, lengthy review. Brief lengthy?? Well...it'll be a lengthy review as far as size goes but it'll be brief on specifics.

My Modest Ray Stevens Mp3 collection...

When it comes to Mp3's I actually don't have too many. I uploaded almost all of my Ray Stevens CD's onto my computer's music program but I don't count those as Mp3's because I didn't officially purchase them as Mp3 digital downloads. I purchased that music on CD and then uploaded the songs onto my computer. However, there are a few digital downloads of Ray Stevens that I purchased exclusively as Mp3's and those are...

2007: Ruby Falls
2008: Hurricane
2008: Hey Bubba, Watch This!
2008: Bubba, the Wine Connoisseur
2008: The Cure
2008: Sucking Sound
2008: Rub It In
2008: Down Home Beach
2009: Concrete Sailor**

**- "Concrete Sailor" was available as a free digital download in early 2009 from Ray's web-site. It's the lead-off track on Ray's trucker-themed CD, One For the Road, so technically I didn't purchase that Mp3 since it was free. I've since purchased the physical copy of that CD, though.

Ray issued a comical version of "Blue Christmas" around the same time his "We The People" music video hit it big on You Tube. The comical version had been done previously by the fictional group, Seymour Swine and the Squealers, and Ray commented that he'd known of that version for awhile but on the spur of the moment decided he wanted to record the song the same way. The stuttering version of "Blue Christmas" was issued as part of a special EP collection available on-line. You can purchase the EP which consists of just three songs: "White Christmas", in which Ray demonstrates his love of R&B; the stuttering version of "Blue Christmas"; and the Ray Stevens original "Deck The Halls With Teardrops". The EP is available at Amazon and it shows November 25, 2009 as it's release date.

He recorded the traditional version of "Blue Christmas" on his non-comical CD, Ray Stevens Christmas. This CD was not heavily promoted because "We The People" and it's million hit You Tube success wiped out all interest and attention that normally would have been given to a seasonal project in December. I gave the CD a lot of attention but there's only so much one blogger can do. I assumed this season Ray would delve into the non-comical Christmas CD but instead of pushing/hyping that particular CD Ray decided to put together a comical music video of "Nightmare Before Christmas" which was included on his 1997 comical Christmas CD, Christmas Through a Different Window.

Later, a special offer at Ray's web-store was available which combined the 1997 and 2009 Christmas CD's and added a bonus DVD of "Nightmare Before Christmas".

As of this writing the music video has gotten 76,256 You Tube hits...it's been available now for almost 2 months. The actual upload date was November 3, 2010 and January 3, 2011 will make 2 months. The new Congress is sworn in during the month of January and given that Ray commented a few weeks ago that he's got a lot of new political songs he'll be recording I assume 2011 will involve a lot more topical/political material but that's anyone's guess.

My Modest Ray Stevens magazine collection...

Unfortunately my scanner couldn't get the entire image scanned...the magazine title, Cashbox, disappears at the letter, X. This is a chart publication, a competitor of Billboard, and this is the June 15, 1974 issue. The picture of Ray is the same one used on the commercial single of "The Moonlight Special". However, that particular single hadn't been issued when this magazine was released. In spite of the cover shot there's only a short column about Ray and it deals with "The Streak" which was sitting in the Pop Top-5, having already reached it's peak position. The column ends with a reference to Ray's follow-up, the aforementioned "The Moonlight Special". I had purchased this on eBay several years ago and was hoping for a much more in-depth write-up and so I was slightly disappointed that the write-up was basically the size of a newspaper column. I got lucky, though, because not long after this purchase I came across the July 4, 1970 issue of TV Guide...this is the issue which features a write-up about Ray.

This write-up came about thanks in large part to Ray being the host of Andy Williams' television show during the summer months. The name of the article is "Who Is Ray Stevens?". The article ties in with the inside joke about Ray's low-key demeanor and how in spite of having several million selling hits that the public at large still had no idea who Ray Stevens was. The cast of The Courtship of Eddie's Father was on the cover that week...the mailing label of who previously owned the issue is still on the magazine and so I blotted out the address and the name. I purchased this TV Guide, as I mentioned, on eBay. Ray's show aired Saturday night on NBC at 7:30. Looking at the program content it shows that Ray performed "Freddie Feelgood", "Games People Play", and a couple of songs I'd never heard of: "I Got a Woman" and "Hi-Heel Sneakers". The cast sing "Reach Out in the Darkness".

Country Song Roundup with Ray on the cover. The issue was released in 1977 and it ties in with his single at the time: "Get Crazy With Me". In the interview the author writes about Ray's past and present. This was during the era of his career where he concentrated on having success with non-comical recordings and in interviews he'd often downplay the comedic aspect of his career in favor of the serious, thought-provoking artist he wanted to be known as. Ironically, though, 1977 kicked off with his chicken clucking version of "In the Mood" which had been released late in 1976. If one examines Ray's career you'll realize just how many non-comical songs he recorded...during the entire decade of the '70s, for example, he released just one album devoted to all-comedy: 1974's Boogity-Boogity. This means that all of his other studio album releases were of a serious nature. Late in 1970 and into 1971 he had some success with the novelty song, "Bridget the Midget", which originally was available as a single-only.

This is a souvenir booklet that was issued in 1977. Included are pictures of Ray from the early '70s as well as the mid '70s. It also includes a promo section for pop singer, Del Shannon. One of the pictures shows Ray seated on a carousel...while another shows him decked out in the white jump suit that he wore on the Misty album. I'd written about this booklet before...I've written about pretty much all of these magazines already but never in one all-encompassing blog. I actually don't have that many magazines with Ray Stevens coverage but I'm showing images of some of the magazines that I've got in my collection. I've got some Country Weekly issues with write-up's about Ray...but would you believe that he's never appeared on the cover of any Country Weekly issue?



In this April 1979 issue of Country Music Magazine the article about Ray is the third promoted item on the cover. Johnny Cash, of course, is the cover subject. Charlie Rich is spotlighted in an article by Bob Allen. Ray's write-up is written by John Pugh...on the magazine's cover it refers to Ray as The Mad Genius of Music Row. The write-up doesn't necessarily spotlight any current recordings or promote any albums but instead spotlights a career over-view and goes into detail about his recording studio talents and he gives his philosophy on recording songs and how emotionally attached he is to life in the recording studio. The author compares and contrasts Ray's over-joyous attitude toward Nashville and the music industry with the attitudes expressed by other artists who don't come away with the same enthusiasm toward Nashville. Some writers/critics through the years have said that Ray is like a kid in a candy shop when he's inside his recording studio. Ray, of course, produces and arranges his own songs and at one time wrote a majority of his own material. When you have an artist that approaches things as a producer would then it's very easy to see the contrasts between Ray and other artists in country music...or music in general. I think if singers double as their own producer or have some sort of impact on the creative and technical side of their careers, instead of just showing up at a studio and singing, it enables the singer to develop this same sort of affection toward making music as Ray has always demonstrated in his interviews through the decades.

In this 1980 issue of Country Song Roundup the big news was centered around Ray's hit single, "Shriner's Convention". The cover story, More Than Meets the Ear, deals with Ray's often over-shadowed talents due to the enormous popularity of his comical recordings. An entire music audience laughing at Ray's comical songs are typically unaware of just how serious of an artist Ray is...even fewer know of his behind-the-scenes talents as a musician, producer, arranger, and writer. This write-up, much like the write-up's in 1979 and 1977, tried gallantly to give exposure to the many styles of music that show up on a typical Ray Stevens album. The most telling aspect of the write-up came mid-way through the article where Ray let it be known that while he's having success with the comical song that he has no intentions of abandoning serious material. He certainly kept his word because the albums he issued in 1981, 1982, and 1983 were all non-comical.

In this particular October 1979 issue, as you can see, Dolly Parton is on the cover. There's a write-up about Ray in here called Help Me, Ray Stevens. This promo/write-up was based on Ray's single on Warner Brothers, "I Need Your Help, Barry Manilow", which hit earlier in 1979 but was still being promoted as his current single when this issue was released. The write-up is lengthy, as far as write-up's go, and it offers a lot of quotes from Ray where he gives his opinions on the music industry and how anyone can be successful if they have the right promotion team. He remarks that a lot of songs become 'hits' simply by being promoted a lot and psychologically it causes a consumer to purchase the song through repetitious promotion. He also remarks that there are other kinds of 'hits' that don't sell an incredible amount immediately but strike a chord with consumers and eventually become big sellers over the course of time. Ray comes across neutral in his opinions over the different types of hit songs leaving it up to the reader to come to their own conclusions...in a sense the Ray Stevens belief system of 1979 when it comes to having hit songs is very much similar to modern-day 2010 Ray Stevens. There's also mention of his hectic TV show appearances which included taping episodes of Merv Griffin, Mike Douglas, and The Tonight Show. The author of the write-up hints of an upcoming all-comedy album from Ray...referring, perhaps, to the Shriner's Convention album of 1980. If you remember, "Shriner's Convention" was released as a single very early in 1980 and there's always been the possibility that the song was already written and recorded well before the public at large heard it. Obviously there was a change in record labels, though, from Warner Brothers to RCA by the time the Shriner song was released. A performance on a 1979 episode of Pop! Goes the Country showcases "Shriner's Convention" but, ironically, Ray opened the show singing his 1976 hit, "You Are So Beautiful".

In this 1986 issue of Music City News we're a couple of years into Ray's exclusive country comedy approach. Ray, in late 1984, decided to shift gears and go all-comedy upon signing with MCA. His debut album for the label, He Thinks He's Ray Stevens, would eventually reach the Country Top-5 and sell over a million copies [Platinum] in the process. This was followed up late in 1985 with I Have Returned which hit #1 on the Country album chart and would eventually be certified Gold for sales of over 500,000. He was in between comedy albums when this 1986 issue of Music City News was released and the write-up went into detail about his career decisions and the choice of going all-comedy after years of attempting to gain mainstream acceptance as a serious, non-comical performer. In a lot of ways Ray did have his share of success with non-comedy songs but when you compare the overall sales and popularity of the non-comical verses the comical it clearly shows that the comedy has always reigned supreme. The story, There's Something Funny About Ray Stevens, examines that relationship between the non-comical and comical sides of Ray and how the most commercially successful won out. 1986 would be the first year that Ray won the Comedian of the Year award from the Music City News readers. He won this particular fan-voted award in 1986, 1987, 1988, 1989, 1990, 1991, 1992, 1993, and 1994. Also on this cover are two of my other favorite singers: George Jones and Conway Twitty.

This January 1990 issue of Music City News was the magazine's annual New Year's issue. Inside a lot of artists gave their predictions for 1990 and a lot of New Year's resolutions were addressed. This issue also focused on the country comedy acts...with Ray leading the pack. In the write-up it examines the various performers in the country comedy field and each comic gives their opinions of what's funny and what style of humor best suits them and their audience. Ray, by far, was the most commercially successful of the acts and he was also the most legitimately skilled as a singer whereas the other comics spotlighted were traditional stand-up comedians who used country and southern culture as part of their act. By the time this issue was released Ray had been the recipient of the Comedian of the Year award four consecutive times: 1986, 1987, 1988, and 1989. The Music City News awards were held each June.