EVERY Billboard #1 country hit of 1975 discussion thread

This was T.G.s first chart entry ever, and it hit the top - it's always cool to see someone knock it out of the park in their first at-bat. Country music is full of "demon rum" laments like this, but surprisingly few have been #1 hits.

I like the instrumentation, the steel guitar has more of a West Coast Cosmic feel than a Nashville one.

Melodyland Records was indeed an odd bird in Berry Gordy's menagerie. I found a 45 discography - it was home to Pat Boone, Dorsey Burnette and Jud Strunk!

45 Discography for Melodyland/Hitsville Records

 

...This (T.G. in general, not just this one record) was the only particular major success of the Melodyland label though, wasn't it? IIRC, some not greatly successful Boone Sisters sides on the label were later recycled on Curb as Debby Boone album tracks...The label didn't"t last long, obviously, so...

 

It would seem Mr. Sheppard's success was the only kind Melodyland / Hitsville enjoyed, indeed.

 

Pat Boone certainly wasn't moving units like he had been two decades earlier.

Just noticed another blast from the past name on Melodyland: Terry Stafford, he of "Suspicion" fame.

Terry had recently been on Atlantic, where he had the original 1973 hit version of his song "Amarillo By Morning".

A 21-year-old Army enlistee from Pearsall, TX - a fella named George Harvey Strait - took a real liking to that song.

 

Going to the next #1 now . . .
"I Care" by Tom T. Hall
(#1 for 1 week - February 22, 1975)


Wikipedia entry

 

"I Care" was the Storyteller's 6th #1 and as the label scan shows, comes from his children's album. I like it a far sight more than the one about little baby ducks (also included on the album but originally from 1973).

Love the chord changes, especially on the verses.

As a 10-year-old at the time, the B-side greatly appealed to me as well:

 

Also, "I've Got A Yearning" from this era I love. Merle Haggard in that era was always a nice listen.

 

A nice classic. Tom T. Hall in that era was always nice. "Fox On The Run" from this LP is a all time favorite. My Promo 45 gets lots of action.

 

And I love this fine cover just as well as I enjoy Don Gibson's own fine recording for RCA Victor. I loved it new, only more so now with age. Love Ronnie Milsap and his RCA years a lot. Fine records all.

 

Advancing to the next one . . .
"It's Time To Pay The Fiddler" by Cal Smith
(#1 for 1 week - March 1, 1975)


Mr. Smith's third and final country #1, per Wikipedia entry. Ironically, given that he'd once been a member of Ernest Tubb's Texas Troubadours, Mr. Tubb did his own cover of this that can be heard here.

 

Cal was an interesting case - after leaving Tubb he knocked around the margins for a few years with a string of minor hits on Kapp, signed to Decca and was big for a couple of years, then settled back into a long string of modest successes.

He was at our point in the timeline coming off the huge success of "Country Bumpkin", and I reckon that's the main reason "Fiddler" hit the top. Much of the arrangement is very "Bumpkin"--esque.

It's a solid but pretty standard "I must not cheat!" tune, but not really #1 material imo.

His first #1, "The Lord Knows I'm Drinking", definitely was. I sure knew my share of Mrs. Johnsons in my small town days.

Cal's first major success was his #4 cover of the pop hit "I've Found Someone Of My Own" by The Free Movement. I love the original, but I'm not so keen on the country makeover.

 

I'm pretty much the same way on Narvel Felts' cover of Dobie Gray's "Drift Away."

 

Yes indeed. And don't even get me started on the inexplicably massive remake of "Drift Away" coming at the end of last century.

 

Let's just say there, we're on the same page . . .

 

I don't remember the A-side, but the b-side got some airplay--or I heard it on a jukebox, because I remember it.

JcS

 

I had no idea Motown had a record chart this highly on the country chart.

JcS

 

Oh yeah, "Sneaky Snake" got a lot of play in my neck of the woods (the Mountain West). I was quite surprised much later to find out that it was a "mere" B-side.

 

It turns out "Sneaky Snake" was the side promoted at pop stations, and got to #55 on the Hot 100 ("I Care" didn't chart).

That's probably why we remember hearing it!

 

It wasn't uncommon for different sides to be promoted in different genres - a #1 country whose "flip" made the pop charts in varying positions.

Meanwhile, to get a little more discussion rolling . . . this one may light a fire . . .
"Linda On My Mind" by Conway Twitty
(#1 for 1 week - March 15, 1975)
For a change, I'll put up a clip of him performing it on Hee Haw . . .


Wikipedia entry

 

For a young rocker, I saw a lot more of HEE HAW than I probably should have, but it was more likely earlier than this. My recollection is that it was on Saturday night, and by this point in my senior year, I wasn't home too often on that night.

I'm not a Twitty fan, and don't remember this at all (I'm not where I can listen to it right now).

JcS

 

I dealt with a Mrs. Johnson, and me doing Saturday Morning Oldies on WYSH-AM 1380 in Clinton, Tennessee many years ago. Jim Stair owned the station, old biddy called incessantly, "Why don't you play Gospel all the time". Cal Smith's "The Lord Knows I'm Drinking" got cued up a lot, shut her up the rest of the shift. Jim Stair laughed his head off at my answer to "Mrs. Johnson" and how I shut her up!

 

We at last come to the top country artist of the decade, at least according to Joel Whitburn's chart point system.

Conway's 17th #1 (in just 7 years) is one of his more iconic "cheatin' man" songs. Dude was always fighting - and often losing to - temptation, constantly torn apart by the agony he's putting his old woman through but powerless to resist the charms of the new one.

Funny thing was, he'd been with his wife Mickey since 1956 (and would be until 1984).

I had a chance to visit Twitty City in the late '80s. It was essentially his version of Graceland, and not that bad a way to spend a couple of hours.

 

"Linda on my mind" is a solid song with a solid performance - you can rely on Conway. I like it, but I do wish he'd really tear into it with some real emotion, something he's shown he's very capable of.

 

A joke I used to hear in Nashville was that country stardom was just the first step in eventually owning your own theme park!

 

Or, years down the road, your own theatre in Branson.