 Various Artists The 70s volume of Priority's I Love Country series is only marginally less satisfying than the 60s volume. This one brings back a whole lot of guilty pleasures that many 70s survivors would probably prefer to forget: "All the Gold in California" by the Gatlin Brothers, "Rhinestone Cowboy" by Glen Campbell," "Sleeping Single in a Double Bed" by Barbara Mandrell, "Every Which Way But Loose" by Eddie Rabbitt, "Coal Miner's Daughter" by Loretta Lynn, and the love-it-or-hate-it "Convoy" by C.W. McCall. Mostly, these are great songs, illustrating the shift toward mainstream pop that dominated Nashville in the 70's. The tracks vacillate between shiny country-pop and wispy traditionalism, the latter reflected by "Coal Miner's Daughter," "All I Have to Do is Dream" (by Bobbie Gentry and Glen Campbell) and Emmylou Harris's live rendition of the Patsy Cline classic "Sweet Dreams." Some of the songs wouldn't sound out of place on the 60s compilation: Sonny James's "Empty Arms" sounds downright reactionary against, say, "Sharing the Night Together" by Dr. Hook, and "For the Good Times" by Ray Price is about as MOR as you can get without becoming Roger Whittaker. The unifying factor, though, is that these are just all good songs, pop, country, or whatever. Well, maybe not all. Tom T. Hall's "I Love" is a sappy favorite for many, though I can't justify liking a song that begins with the line "I love little baby ducks" but isn't trying to be offensive. It's easy to see why this was a mammoth hit (like "Butterfly Kisses" was), but it's hardly Tom T. Hall's finest moment … although if Andy Rooney were the vocalist I'd probably declare it to be one of my all-time favorite songs. "Hello Darlin'" by Conway Twitty is pretty aggressively mediocre, and doesn't work well in my mind in the wake of that infomercial that began airing right after he died, in which his disembodied head saying "Hello darlin'" against a black background opened the commercial. Too spooky, and then the rest of it is just so-so. And Bobby Goldsboro weighs in with another piece of shit (he did "Honey" on Vol. 1) in "Watching Scotty Grow" – although it's a piece of shit I like, utterly pandering but perfectly catchy. As with the previous volume, this disc features enough moments of glory to balance out the also-rans, and there are some nice, nearly-forgotten gems like "Talking in Your Sleep" by Crystal Gayle, "Tonight You Belong to Me" by Dottie West, and Lynn Anderson's "How Can I Unlove You." This one seems to polarize people a bit faster than the other volume, and I'd suspect the 80s and 90s volumes would be even more "you either like it or you don't." I won't venture that far – much as I rail against classic rock as a radio genre, I call for a "classic country radio station." Every hour on the hour: "Rhinestone Cowboy," "Sharing the Night Together," "Wichita Lineman," "On the Road Again," "Why Not Me," "All the Gold in California," and yes, "Convoy." These are songs I wouldn't mind hearing til I was tired of them. Fortunately I can overplay this I Love Country disc until radio decides to.
Review by Jo Ann Glans |