Modern Sounds in Country and Western Music
Modern Sounds in Country and Western Music is a studio album by American singer and pianist Ray Charles. It was recorded in February 1962 at Capitol Studios in New York City and United Western Recorders in Hollywood, and released in April of that year by ABC-Paramount Records.
Modern Sounds in Country and Western Music
The album departed further stylistically from the rhythm and blues music Charles had recorded for Atlantic Records in the 1950s. It featured country, folk, and Western music standards reworked by Charles in popular song forms of the time, including R&B, pop, and jazz. Charles produced the album with Sid Feller, who helped the singer select songs to record, and performed alongside saxophonist Hank Crawford, a string section conducted by Marty Paich, and a big band arranged by Gil Fuller and Gerald Wilson.
Modern Sounds in Country and Western Music was an immediate critical and commercial success. The album and its four hit singles brought Charles greater mainstream notice and recognition in the pop market, as well as airplay on both R&B and country radio stations. The album and its lead single, "I Can't Stop Loving You", were both certified gold by the Recording Industry Association of America in 1962, as each record had sold at least 500,000 copies in the United States.
The album's integration of soul and country challenged racial barriers in popular music at the height of the Civil Rights Movement. In the process of recording the album, Charles became one of the first African-American musicians to exercise complete artistic control over his own recording career. In retrospect, it has been considered by critics as his best studio record and a landmark recording in American music. According to Robert Christgau, the album "transfigured pop, prefigured soul, and defined modern country & western music."[3] It has been called one of the greatest albums of all time by publications such as Rolling Stone and Time.
Background[edit]
After his Atlantic Records contract ended, Ray Charles signed with ABC-Paramount Records in November 1959, obtaining a much more generous contract than other artists had at the time.[4] Following his commercial and pop crossover breakthrough with the hit single "What'd I Say" earlier that year, ABC offered Charles a $50,000 annual advance, higher royalties than previously offered and eventual ownership of his masters—a very valuable and lucrative deal at the time.[5] Composed by Charles himself, the single furthered Charles's mainstream appeal, while becoming a Top 10 pop hit and selling a million copies in the United States, despite the ban placed on the record by some radio stations, in response to the song's sexually-suggestive lyrics.[6] However, by the time of the release of the instrumental jazz LP Genius + Soul = Jazz (1960) for ABC's subsidiary label Impulse!, Charles had virtually given up on writing original material and had begun to follow his eclectic impulses as an interpreter.[6]
Following his blues fusion with gospel and jazz influences on his earlier Atlantic material, which had brought him much fame and controversy, Charles sought to experiment with country music.[7] As Charles himself noted in the liner notes of What'd I Say (1959), he was influenced by the genre in his youth, writing that he "used to play piano in a hillbilly band" and that he believed that he "could do a good job with the right hillbilly song today."[8] At Atlantic, he attempted to incorporate this style and influence with his cover of country singer Hank Snow's "I'm Movin' On". Charles later said about the song, "When I heard Hank Snow sing 'Moving On', I loved it. And the lyrics. Keep in mind, I'm a singer, so I like lyrics. Those lyrics are great, so that's what made me want to do it."[4] The "I'm Movin' On" sessions were his last for Atlantic.[9]
Charles's recording of his acclaimed studio effort The Genius of Ray Charles (1959) brought him closer to expressing his jazz and pop crossover ambitions. Described by one music critic as "the most important of his albums for Atlantic", the record was the first to introduce Charles's musical approach of blending his brassy R&B sound with the more middle of the road, pop-oriented style, while performing in the presence of a big band ensemble.[10] Recording of the album, as well his ABC-Paramount debut, The Genius Hits the Road (1960), a collection of place-name songs devoted to parts of the United States, expanded on Charles's thematic and conceptually-organized approach to albums rather than commercially successful singles production.[10] Inspired by this approach and his recording of "I'm Movin' On", Charles originally made plans for a single-less concept album.[8][11]
When Charles had announced that he wanted to work on an album of country music in 1961, during a period of racial segregation and tension in the United States, he received generally negative commentary and feedback from his peers, including fellow R&B musicians and ABC-Paramount executives.[4] The country album concept, however, meant more to Charles as a test of his record label's faith in him and respect for his artistic freedom than as a test of social tolerance among listeners amid racial distinctions of country and R&B.[9] Fueled by his esteem for creative control, Charles pitched the idea of a country album to ABC representatives.[9] Following the successful lobby of the concept and a contract renewal in early 1962, which was linked to the launching of his own Tangerine label, Charles prepared his band for the recording sessions that produced Modern Sounds in Country and Western Music.[9]
Music and lyrics[edit]
The album's themes are about heartbreak and love, with most of the material chosen by Charles being ballads. The concept which had originally attracted the interest of Charles to this style of music was the strength he admired in writing a ballad's somber or melancholy lyrics and then performing the ballad with aesthetic and emotional stability; an element he had found to be common in even the most diverse musical genres.[13] Writer Daniel Cooper said of Charles's adaptation of country elements, "His country forays play like a series of intricate variations or like one long meditation on the expansive qualities of music commonly described as the white man's blues."[13] AllMusic's Stephen Cook writes that "Charles intones the sleepy-blue nuances of country crooners while still giving the songs a needed kick with his gospel outbursts."[1]
Despite the racial and social implications of R&B and country at the time, Charles did not agree with contemporary views of race records and other genres, including pop and country, as essentially different.[11] In an interview with Ben Fong-Torres of Rolling Stone, Charles said of the similarities between the blues and country music, "[T]he words to country songs are very earthy like the blues, see, very down. They're not as dressed up, and the people are very honest and say, 'Look, I miss you, darlin', so I went out and I got drunk in this bar.' That's the way you say it. Where in Tin Pan Alley will say, 'Oh, I missed you darling, so I went to this restaurant and I sat down and I had dinner for one.' That's cleaned up now, you see? But country songs and the blues is like it is."[11]
In an interview with music historian Peter Guralnick, Charles further elaborated on his understanding, stating "You take country music, you take black music, you got the same goddamn thing exactly."[13] While Modern Sounds features mostly covers of country and western music standards, its sound and musical style are marked by the heavy rhythm and blues influence of Charles's playing. A considerable amount of the material's melancholy lyrics and words are backed by piano and orchestral arrangements that are rooted in jazz, as well as West Coast and Charles's style of piano blues.[17] Charles has said that the country album was "completely different from rhythm and blues".[18]
"You Don't Know Me" has a string and vocal ensemble production and themes of desirous unrequited love.[19] The song's narrator longs for a woman that views him as "just a friend/That's all I've ever been/For you don't know me."[19] AllMusic editor Bill Janovitz writes of the song's affecting narrative, stating "The genius, the pathos, and the soul that is Charles oozes into this recording [...] No matter how many times one hears the song, it still induces chills down the spine after the narrator blows any chance he might have had and is left alone at the end."[19]
Both composed by Hank Williams, "You Win Again" and "Hey, Good Lookin'" are derived from Williams's different emotional perspectives. The difference is further accentuated by Charles's interpretations of the songs.[16] "I Can't Stop Loving You", a countrypolitan ballad with lush, cushioned arrangements, was placed at the 11th spot in the track listing, assumed by Sid Feller to be the album's weakest song, after which becoming the album's top-selling single. Charles was disappointed with him, as Feller was in charge of sequencing for the album.[16]
Charles also covered the heartbreak ballads "It Makes No Difference Now" and "I Love You So Much It Hurts", both originally by honky tonk musician Floyd Tillman,. The Ted Daffan-penned "Worried Mind" and "Born to Lose" expand his take on country balladry and feature a blend of piano blues with string arrangements.[20]
Marketing and sales[edit]
Modern Sounds in Country and Western Music was released in April 1962[21] and quickly became one of the best-selling albums recorded by a black musician of the time, as well as one of the best-selling country albums,[7] shipping at least 500,000 copies in its first three months of release.[22] This achievement was due in part to the mainstream promotional efforts Modern Sounds had received from ABC prior to and following release.[23] The album proved to be a crossover hit as well, as distributors claimed the record had been selling in pop, R&B and country music markets; at the time, often referred to as white and black markets during the period.[23]
Writing of the album shortly after its release, Billboard magazine claimed that, "in addition to being powerful dealer material, this package will fracture knowledgeable jockeys who will find in it a wealth of material to talk about as well as play."[23] By mid-April, reports of the album's sales and radio airplay had started coming in from cities such as Dallas and Philadelphia. On June 23, 1962, the mono issue of Modern Sounds replaced the West Side Story soundtrack album as the number one album in the United States, knocking it off the top of the Billboard Pop Albums chart.[23]
The album spawned four charting singles, "Born to Lose", "Careless Love", "I Can't Stop Loving You" and "You Don't Know Me", the latter two of which went number one on the Adult Contemporary chart.[24] The hit singles quickly gained a significant amount of radio airplay on both country and R&B stations.[25] By mid-May, the album's lead single, "I Can't Stop Loving You", had sold 700,000 copies within its first four weeks of release.[23] Record dealers began describing the album as "equal in sales action to some of the early Presley disks" and, after moving 400,000 copies of the single, influential Atlanta record distributor Gwen Kestler told Billboard magazine that "the record is so hot in her district that people who don't even own record players are buying it."[23] "I Can't Stop Loving You" hit number one on the Billboard Pop Singles chart on June 2, spending five consecutive weeks at the top of the chart. By the time it fell off the top, the single was reported to have reached nearly a million and a half in sales, moving over 100,000 copies per week. In July the record spent two weeks at number one in Great Britain.[26]
As Modern Sounds in Country and Western Music and its singles were performing well in the United States, Charles toured Europe with his big band and the Raelettes.[23] He performed both his signature R&B and jazz material at such venues as Paris Olympia and the Hot Club de France, where he was hailed as "a true jazz artist in the tradition of Louis Armstrong and Duke Ellington."[23] Upon his return to the United States at the end of the summer, ABC-Paramount had officially recognized his achievements, presenting Charles with two gold records—one for "I Can't Stop Loving You", the other for his Modern Sounds album—during a live concert performance at the Convention Hall in Asbury Park, New Jersey.[23] Through his ventures into country music and the European jazz scene, Charles's white audience grew significantly at concerts.[23] The album was quickly followed by another recording of country, western and pop standards covered by Charles, and recorded in September 1962. Modern Sounds in Country and Western Music, Vol. 2 was released six months after the first volume and proved to be equally successful, while also earning a gold certification by the following year.[22][27] Following his tenure with ABC-Paramount, Charles later went on to achieve more commercial success recording country music under Columbia Records throughout most of the 1980s.[28]
Legacy and influence[edit]
Country music[edit]
In the wake of Modern Sounds in Country and Western Music and its success, country music experienced an immediate increase in popularity. According to music writer Daniel Cooper, "the album raised the genre's profile", specifically Nashville sound, which Charles had covered.[13] Benefiting from this were songwriters, music publishers, and country singers who covered the subgenre's material. As noted by Cooper, by the end of 1962, Nashville country publishers were being held as "the hottest source of music material in the record business these days."[13] Charles's success with the stylistic fusion of country and soul on Modern Sounds led to similar efforts from artists such as Candi Staton and Solomon Burke, who were greatly influenced by the album.[44] Many country music artists such as Willie Nelson and Buck Owens have cited Charles's take on the genre with the album as a major influence.[7] In an interview for Country Music Television (CMT), Nelson said that the album "did more for country music than any one artist has ever done."[44] Doug Freeman of the Austin Chronicle wrote of Charles's influence through the album, stating:
All tracks were produced by Ray Charles and Sid Feller.
Bibliography