Ray Price - Night Life (1962)
Label - Koch
Producer – Frank Jones; Don Law
Art Direction – uncredited
Nationality - USA
Running Time – 37:36
Track Listing (standout tracks in bold)
1. Introduction And Theme/Night Life
2. Lonely Street
3. Wild Side Of Life
4. Sittin' And Thinkin'
5. Twenty-Fourth Hour
6. Girl In The Night
7. Pride
8. There's No Fool Like A Young Fool
9. If She Could See Me Now
10. Bright Lights And Blonde Haired Women
11. Are You Sure
12. Let Me Talk To You
Something unexpected popped out when I played this album. I’m not a big country music fan (REAL country like this – not what passes as country music these days). And it WAS tough to get through this album. What surprised me is that this is a concept album. By Ray Price. In 1962. WHO KNEW! Certainly not me!
As I said – this is true classic country honky tonk music. Ray Price and his band – the Cherokee Cowboys were riding high when this record came out, and the toured regularly. His spoken word introduction lays out what is to come – songs about living in the night life – a side of life he saw on a regular basis. A life spent on the road full of hotels, bar rooms, one-night stands, heartache, and regrets.
Yet it’s not so much a story being told throughout the album as it is just a collection of simular themed tracks.
In reading about Ray Price I found that as the decade wore on, Price would go on to major superstardom as a mellow balladeer, (working with full string sections) which reached a more mass audience that most probably never even heard this music or his other honky tonk classics that preceded it. This album just may be Price's defining moment as an artist, but I just can’t get into the country of it.
Not recommended.
ABSOLUTE ROCK BIRTHDAYS FOR DECEMBER 12
Dickey Betts is 65; Eric Schenkman from the Spin Doctors is 45
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