Music Review: George Jones—The Complete United Artists Solo Singles

By Cait Brennan

“Country music,” George Jones told music writer Holly George-Warren “is a religion to me.” Well, if country music is a religion, George Jones’s music is one of the bedrock gospels. From 1950s hillbilly hellion to elder statesman of the genre, Jones has always been one of the purest singers in country music. Jones is “just” a country singer the way Sinatra was “just” a saloon singer—both men mastered, then transcended their genres, making each song uniquely their own.

Some of Jones’s finest mid-’60s sides are collected on George Jones—The Complete United Artists Solo Singles, one of three essential country music compilations released on February 12 by those high llamas of music at Omnivore Recordings. No no-shows here; this is prime time Possum, showing the hall of fame singer on a diverse range of material penned by Jones and some of classic country’s greatest songwriters.

By 1962, the 31-year-old Jones already had considerable success on two other labels. Jones cut the rave-up “Why Baby Why” for Starday, and had a pair of big hits for Mercury: “White Lightning” and “Tender Years.” The common denominator throughout Jones’s career was Pappy Daily, the founder of Starday, whose active partnership with Jones lasted from the ’50s until 1971, when Jones arrived at Epic and Billy Sherrill took the reins. Pappy brought George to United Artists, where they would build on their earlier success.

“She Thinks I Still Care” is Jones’s first UA single, and it’s another thing we owe Cowboy Jack Clement. Cowboy’s publishing company repped the song and Cowboy dogged Jones relentlessly—and, at Pappy’s insistence, relinquished half the publishing royalties—before Jones gave in and grudgingly recorded one of the greatest songs in country music history. Dickie Lee wrote the tune, and one thing’s for sure, the protagonist fares better than Lee’s other two songwriting hits, “Patches” (protagonist’s girlfriend drowned in muddy, muddy river) and “Laurie (Strange Things Happen)” (protagonist’s girlfriend is a long dead ghost á la Large Marge).

The flip side, “Sometimes You Just Can’t Win,” is a great song in its own right. Understandably overshadowed by the smash A-side, “Sometimes” is a dark-night-of-the-soul torch song with a soaring vocal that made it to #17 on the charts; on anybody else’s resume it’d be a solid hit.

In the era when these recordings were made, the idea of an “album” of cohesive, thematically linked material pretty much didn’t exist. LPs were essentially just collections of 45s, with a little filler thrown in for good measure. These 45s were recorded and pressed quickly, capitalizing on musical fads, other folks’ hits, you name it. Watusi this week; doin’ the swim next. Versatility was a must, and on these sides Jones proves himself adept at a wide variety of styles.

The gospel-themed “Beacon In The Night” is a plunky, percolated hand-clapper that’s over before you know it. Its B-side, “He Made Me Free,” is a soulful spiritual that delivers guaranteed redemption in 2:38. A folk murder ballad from the point of view of a hardscrabble copper miner in Morenci and Clifton, Arizona, “Open Pit Mine” lays it out in stark terms as the miner’s life slowly unravels—and his unfaithful girl’s life ends. Regrets, he’s had a few.

Jones sounds like a different singer entirely on “Geronimo,” a weird and wonderful highlight. The terrific singing cowboy and longtime Johnny Cash sideman Johnny Western, who wrote the tune at Jones’s request, had famously sung the theme from the great knight-errant TV western Have Gun, Will Travel (which, if you haven’t seen it, you really need to see it). Jones fell in love with the sound and Pappy Daily called Johnny Western, giving him a luxurious 24 hours to write and record the music for a similar tune on a “Geronimo” theme. (The song was intended as a tie-in to the 1962 Geronimo movie starring TV’s Rifleman, Chuck Connors, along with his wife Kamala Devi, Adam West, Ross Martin, and Denver Pyle.) “Geronimo” owes a little something to “Kaw-Liga” (and maybe “Big Iron” too), and Jones is doing Elvis or something, but any way you slice it, this one’s a lot of fun.

Sometimes, you get the sense Jones and Pappy were taking potshots in the dark. The slight “He’s So Good To Me” marries a gospel sentiment to an oom-pah-pah beat easily found on most 1960s Hammond organs, but the B-side, “Magic Valley,” aims higher, a death-and-redemption ballad that swings those pearly gates wide open.

Jones does a fine job on Cowboy’s great “A Girl I Used To Know,” later recorded to great success by Porter Wagoner and Dolly Parton as “Just Someone I Used To Know.” (Gotye, Cowboy Jack’s people will be in touch.) The flip side, “Big Fool Of The Year,” written by Ernest Tubb’s son Justin, beat Jack Greene’s “Statue Of A Fool” to the punch by about seven years and was a #13 hit itself.

It’s the classic “Gladys, seriously, I didn’t mean to sleep with that gal at the bar” song on Cowboy’s “Not What I Had In Mind,” a serviceable honky-tonk weeper that feels more than a bit like a sequel to “She Thinks I Still Care.” It’s good, but the flip side, “I Saw Me,” is great. “For the first time tonight, I saw me,” Jones sings, “and I’m ashamed . . . I looked into my eyes and saw the reason why she cries.” It’s a withering self-assessment of a man who’s done wrong time and time again without knowing, or caring, who he’s hurt. If he’d known what was ahead in the ’70s and ’80s, Jones might have taken it to heart. It’s an outstanding performance of a truly great song written by June Davis, later recorded in 1965 by Esther Phillips in a powerful, must-hear R&B version for Atlantic that sadly failed to chart. Modern soulsters, cover this one, stat.

The obligatory heartbreak Christmas single “Lonely Christmas Call” finds a father and his kids pining for the no-good mother that ran for the hills. Think of it this way, George, at least she left you the kids this time (cf. “The Grand Tour”). The flip side is almost certainly the most hilariously obnoxious thing in the Jones catalog, “My Mom And Santa Claus (Twistin’ Santa Claus),” which takes all the charm of “I Saw Mommy Kissin’ Santa Claus” and forces it to do the twist at gunpoint (only it sounds more like the Watusi). Somebody call the Krampus.

We’re back to the country with “You Comb Her Hair,” a gorgeous Hank Cochran/Harlan Howard song that would be right at home in the hands of rising country star Buck Owens and his ace sideman Don Rich—and, in fact, appears on Omnivore Recordings’ excellent, previously unissued Don Rich Sings George Jones, which came out January 22 (review). The flip side—”Ain’t It Funny What A Fool Will Do”—is a winner, too and was co-written by George Jones and Johnny Mathis. Johnny “Country” Mathis, that is. There are two Johnny Mathises. Mathii? I’ll leave it to you, dear reader, to determine what the plural of “Mathis” is, but this one has the rare distinction of being one of the only country acts ever to release a record on Chicago’s bluesy Chess Records.

Harlan Howard makes another of his numerous songwriting appearances here with “Your Heart Turned Left (And I Was On The Right).” This one, with all due love to Jones, sounds like Pappy was intentionally trying to make a soundalike Buck Owens record, which ain’t a bad thing by any means. Jones is better served on Freddie Hart’s “My Tears Are Overdue,” his bourbon-soaked baritone lingering melancholic over every sorrowful note. “Something I Dreamed” is an ambitious Harlan Howard waltz with some tricky timing, but Jones makes it look easy. You can feel a little Liverpool influence on “Where Does A Little Tear Come From,” but it’s more “Ferry Cross The Mersey” than “I Want To Hold Your Hand.”

As the compilation—and thus the ’60s themselves—progresses, you can hear Jones and Pappy adjusting, absorbing new sounds, trying to find—or make—a place for Jones’s distinctive voice in the whirlwind of sound that was changing the country faster than anybody could keep up. Every so often they completely nailed it, and “The Race Is On” is one of those records. It’s full of swingin’ 1965-a-go-go rock and roll influence, with funky steel guitar picking drenched in reverb, and Jones spouting lyrics at a breakneck pace, yet still it’s undeniably, indelibly country. It’s been covered by everybody from the Grateful Dead to the Chipmunks, and if that’s not a hit, I can’t help you. The fine flip, “She’s Lonesome Again,” has not yet been covered by rodents.

The Sonny James/Carole Smith song “Least Of All” is a classic betrayal song that Jones delivers with great feeling, dropping in one of those low-register dips that’ll give you chills. “Brown To Blue,” another collaboration with Johnny Mathis and Virginia Franks, is a terrific D-I-V-O-R-C-E song with a clever lyrical turn and an almost operatic urgency from George. “The judge forgot to tell me how to live my life alone,” sings Jones, and “by law they took away my rights to love you anymore.” The sequel song, “This Restraining Order Is Bogus,” will probably be on a future compilation.

Obsession isn’t too far away on the follow-up single “Wrong Number,” either. “I bite my lip until the blood runs free, and keep the words ‘I love you’ deep, deep inside of me,” Jones sings, the restraining-order desperation palpable as he calls again and again, but she’s onto him from the start. “The Old Old House” is good mid-’60s country, elevated by Pappy’s production choices and the singalong chorus.

Things pick up considerably on “What’s Money,” a rocker with a kickin’ go-go beat written by Billie Jean Horton, a business-savvy red-headed beauty who was the wife of Johnny Horton and the widow of some fella named Hank Williams. “I Get Lonely In A Hurry” is distinguished by some tasty steel guitar picking and Tommy Jackson’s always-ace fiddling.

The bleary morning-after ballad “World’s Worst Loser,” was released on Christmas Day 1965 to disappointing sales. (It’s credited as “World’s Worst Lover” on the jacket, which is a different kind of problem for sure.) Inman wrote dozens of great songs including “I Don’t Believe You’ve Met My Baby,” and Jones does a particularly fine vocal on this one, pained and tremulous and full of hurt. The B-side, “I Can’t Change Overnight,” is another Jones/Mathis tune arrived at an ironic moment—because for George and Pappy, change was coming, and soon. Pappy and fellow UA A&R man (and co-founder of Mercury Records) Art Talmadge got together and bought United Artists’ subsidiary label Musicor, and Jones soon followed his mentor to the newly independent label, where Jones would stay until dubious business deals, Tammy Wynette, and Billy Sherrill busted up Pappy and George’s partnership but good.

There was only one last George Jones single for United Artists, and it was a whopper—a grade-A humdinger by Cowboy Jack called “Best Guitar Picker” that’s almost a surreal Green Acres send up of a hillbilly country song. Hilarious and somehow fitting that the man who brought Jones his first single for the label also wrote the last single of Jones’s United Artists career.

Jones, of course, was just getting started; his Musicor hits, the Epic and MCA years, Tammy Wynette, “He Stopped Loving Her Today,” and a hellstorm of trouble and greatness all lay ahead of him. And though he’s announced his “retirement” for 2013, he’s also recording a new album with Dolly Parton. While there’s breath in those lungs, here’s hoping that voice never falls silent.

Compilations like this are doubly important because country music is notorious for neglecting its founders. Typical scattershot country compilations not only ignore the B-sides, they ignore the hits—favoring the big number ones and ignoring the not-as-well-remembered Top Ten and Top 20 hits. They also tend to favor bad mixes, subtle and not-so-subtle re-recordings, and a complete disregard for the original material. Once again we must credit Omnivore Recordings, who bring us all Jones’s United Artists singles, A’s and B’s, in chronological order, in stunning original mono mixes, with detailed liner notes and full-color graphics of some of the original labels and sleeves.

If you care about music—especially if you love country music—get yourself to a record store post-haste and get your hands on the gospel according to George Jones.

George Jones—The Complete United Artists Solo Singles is out today from Omnivore Recordings and can be purchased from their website.