Slim Whitman - Mr. Songman/Angeline
Morello Records MRLL-39
I make no secret of the fact that Slim Whitman was my initial introduction to country music—though at the time I wasn’t aware it was country music, it was just great music that made an emotional impact with me. I remember growing up that my parents had a few 78rpm singles by Slim slotted in between Buddy Holly, the Crickets, Johnnie Ray and the Everly Brothers records. The song that made the biggest impression on me was My Heart Is Broken In Three which was coupled with I’m A Fool. That song has stayed with me, due to the simple, yet heartfelt delivery that got to a young boy’s very heart and soul and still resonates almost 60 years later. I’ve always preferred Slim’s 1950s recordings that were more raw, honest and closer to what I understood to be country than his later lush-styled recordings.
In the 1950s and for the first half of the 1960s, Slim developed a unique and very simple country sound utilising crying (or ‘singing’) steel guitar, piano, acoustic guitars and fiddles blended perfectly with his crystal clear tenor that sometimes soared effortlessly into falsetto and the occasional yodel. He endeared himself to UK record buyers in the mid-1950s with such classics as Rose Marie, Indian Love Call and I’ll Take You Home Again Kathleen. He was the first country singer to star at the London Palladium (in 1956) setting new records for consecutive sell-out nights. But by 1960 he had faded from the UK charts, and even in America his records didn’t fare so well. But, he continued to record, usually at the rate of an album every year, though by the mid-1960s he’d gotten bogged down in the dreaded Nashville Sound with lush orchestrations and heavenly choirs virtually drowning out the trademarked ‘singing steel.’
Slim made something of a UK comeback following a 1971 sold out tour and during the 1970s he was one of the biggest-selling country (and even outselling the current pop acts) artists in the UK. This successful revival in the UK led to a TV-advertising campaign in America in 1979 that saw his ALL MY BEST album sell four million copies. That in turn resulted in Slim landing a new recording contract with Cleveland International Records and the release of these two albums—
MR, SONGMAN in 1981 and ANGELINE three years later—now reissued for the first time on CD.
MR. SONGMAN was produced by the legendary pedal steel guitarist Pete Drake in Nashville and features such then veteran session players as Harold Bradley, Pete Wade, Ray Edenton, Hargus ‘Pig’ Robbins, Buddy Harman plus Vic Willis (of the Willis Brothers) on accordion, the Jordanaires and Drake sharing pedal steel duties with Gene O’Neal. Here you’ll find some vintage Whitman performances alongside others that I wish he’d steered well clear of. Typical of the latter is the embarrassing rendition of If I had My Life To Live Over with sickly spoken passages. Far better are the country heart songs like Freddy Weller’s Tonight Is The Night (We Fell In Love) and the infectious Open Up Your Heart with discernible pedal steel to the fore—always a major part of Whitman’s classic hits of the 1950s.
ANGELINE found Slim working with producer Bob Montgomery presenting a more modern musical approach, though still very much in an easy-listening vein. There’s no pedal steel; Kenny Minns provides inventive electric lead and acoustic guitar supported by Ron Oates (keyboards), Harold Bradley (acoustic rhythm guitar), Bob Wray (bass) and James Stroud (drums) with orchestral sweetening by the Nashville String Machine. This remains a first-class record in all respects, it consists of one treat after another, each of them short and sweet. Very few singers could actually bring off this type of material with credibility, but Slim succeeded with songs like Troy Seals’ Tryin’ To Outrun The Wind, Jerry Fuller’s But She Loves Me and fine revivals of Johnny Burnette’s Dreamin’ and Roy Orbison’s Blue Bayou.
Slim Whitman dealt mainly in nostalgia; there was nary a mention of honky-tonks, drinkin’ or cheatin’. There was the occasional broken heart, and unrequited love but more about enduring love against all the odds. Even at his most saccharine, as on I Went To Your Wedding or A Place In The Sun, the performances were filled with genuine, honest emotion. There’s no doubt that Slim Whitman stood firmly by himself as a quiet miracle throughout his long and successful career. These 20 tracks are excellent examples of some of his latter-day recordings—polished to perfection, very pleasant and sure to be salivated over by his many long-time fans.
www.cherryred.co.uk
I make no secret of the fact that Slim Whitman was my initial introduction to country music—though at the time I wasn’t aware it was country music, it was just great music that made an emotional impact with me. I remember growing up that my parents had a few 78rpm singles by Slim slotted in between Buddy Holly, the Crickets, Johnnie Ray and the Everly Brothers records. The song that made the biggest impression on me was My Heart Is Broken In Three which was coupled with I’m A Fool. That song has stayed with me, due to the simple, yet heartfelt delivery that got to a young boy’s very heart and soul and still resonates almost 60 years later. I’ve always preferred Slim’s 1950s recordings that were more raw, honest and closer to what I understood to be country than his later lush-styled recordings.In the 1950s and for the first half of the 1960s, Slim developed a unique and very simple country sound utilising crying (or ‘singing’) steel guitar, piano, acoustic guitars and fiddles blended perfectly with his crystal clear tenor that sometimes soared effortlessly into falsetto and the occasional yodel. He endeared himself to UK record buyers in the mid-1950s with such classics as Rose Marie, Indian Love Call and I’ll Take You Home Again Kathleen. He was the first country singer to star at the London Palladium (in 1956) setting new records for consecutive sell-out nights. But by 1960 he had faded from the UK charts, and even in America his records didn’t fare so well. But, he continued to record, usually at the rate of an album every year, though by the mid-1960s he’d gotten bogged down in the dreaded Nashville Sound with lush orchestrations and heavenly choirs virtually drowning out the trademarked ‘singing steel.’
Slim made something of a UK comeback following a 1971 sold out tour and during the 1970s he was one of the biggest-selling country (and even outselling the current pop acts) artists in the UK. This successful revival in the UK led to a TV-advertising campaign in America in 1979 that saw his ALL MY BEST album sell four million copies. That in turn resulted in Slim landing a new recording contract with Cleveland International Records and the release of these two albums—
MR, SONGMAN in 1981 and ANGELINE three years later—now reissued for the first time on CD.
MR. SONGMAN was produced by the legendary pedal steel guitarist Pete Drake in Nashville and features such then veteran session players as Harold Bradley, Pete Wade, Ray Edenton, Hargus ‘Pig’ Robbins, Buddy Harman plus Vic Willis (of the Willis Brothers) on accordion, the Jordanaires and Drake sharing pedal steel duties with Gene O’Neal. Here you’ll find some vintage Whitman performances alongside others that I wish he’d steered well clear of. Typical of the latter is the embarrassing rendition of If I had My Life To Live Over with sickly spoken passages. Far better are the country heart songs like Freddy Weller’s Tonight Is The Night (We Fell In Love) and the infectious Open Up Your Heart with discernible pedal steel to the fore—always a major part of Whitman’s classic hits of the 1950s.
ANGELINE found Slim working with producer Bob Montgomery presenting a more modern musical approach, though still very much in an easy-listening vein. There’s no pedal steel; Kenny Minns provides inventive electric lead and acoustic guitar supported by Ron Oates (keyboards), Harold Bradley (acoustic rhythm guitar), Bob Wray (bass) and James Stroud (drums) with orchestral sweetening by the Nashville String Machine. This remains a first-class record in all respects, it consists of one treat after another, each of them short and sweet. Very few singers could actually bring off this type of material with credibility, but Slim succeeded with songs like Troy Seals’ Tryin’ To Outrun The Wind, Jerry Fuller’s But She Loves Me and fine revivals of Johnny Burnette’s Dreamin’ and Roy Orbison’s Blue Bayou.
Slim Whitman dealt mainly in nostalgia; there was nary a mention of honky-tonks, drinkin’ or cheatin’. There was the occasional broken heart, and unrequited love but more about enduring love against all the odds. Even at his most saccharine, as on I Went To Your Wedding or A Place In The Sun, the performances were filled with genuine, honest emotion. There’s no doubt that Slim Whitman stood firmly by himself as a quiet miracle throughout his long and successful career. These 20 tracks are excellent examples of some of his latter-day recordings—polished to perfection, very pleasant and sure to be salivated over by his many long-time fans.
www.cherryred.co.uk