CONWAY TWITTY, "HEY LUCY!" C/W "WHEN I'M NOT WITH YOU," M-G-M k12785 (REL. 7/1959)

All aboard for Twitty City! Long before he became an over-the-top country balladeer, Conway Twitty was…an over-the-top rock ‘n’ roller! His many singles for M-G-M Records are an under-rated body of work. Born Harold Jenkins, this singer auditioned for Sam Phillips’ Sun Records and recorded some sides there that remained unknown and unissued until European researchers unearthed them in the 1970s and ‘80s.
His M-G-M decks often suggest an alternate-universe Elvis, where the early affectations of that iconic style were nurtured, fine-tuned and given free rein to do their thing. Twitty’s biggest hit was his intense ballad “It’s Only Make Believe,” a #1 hit in late 1958.

Two singles later, we find him in his ideal yin-yang of rocker-ballad. “Hey Lucy! (Don’cha Put No Lipstick On)” borrows much of its melody from the 1844 pop song hit “Buffalo Gals,” which became part of American folklore. Variants of it are heard on early country recordings and in the ethnographic field recordings of John and Alan Lomax. Its public domain air was ripe for pilfering. Frequent Elvis cleffers Aaron Schroeder and George Weiss (who also co-penned “What a Wonderful World” for Louis Armstrong) are the guilty parties. The melody varies just enough, here and there, that this resemblance may be a coincidence.

It’s one of those bone-dumb ear-worms in which pop music excels; Twitty’s intense, mannered vocal performance is egged on by a vocal chorus as he relates this first-person tale of a guy who has an agenda of serious smoochin’ planned for that evening’s date. Why go through all that fuss when said lipstick will get smeared all over the place?

It’s a creepy song, to be sure, but the full-bodied pop-rock treatment, and Twitty’s bizarre performance, lend it a certain credence. Twitty made better records, but this one is most representative of his musical approach. Multiple key changes increase the sexual tension on this carnal extravaganza.

>>>Hear it HERE!!!<<<

“When I’m Not with You,” an original by Twitty and his songwriting partner Jack Nance, is a meat-and-taters rockaballad. A far better song than the A-side, it allows for Twitty’s quasi-operatic shenanigans and a torrid mid-tempo rhythm, a la Elvis’ Sun recording “Tryin’ to Get to You.” In Nance, Twitty had a genuine Sun Records connection; Jack was a member of Sonny Burgess’ rock ‘n’ roll group and appears on the artist’s Sun singles.
This heartfelt song, with the flavor of “It’s Only Make Believe,” might have been the wiser choice for a chart-friendly side. “Hey Lucy!” managed a miserable #87—quite the comedown from his recent chart-topper and its Top 30 follow-up.

>>>Hear it HERE!!!<<<

Twitty ended his M-G-M stint with a 1963 single; it coupled a cover version of the venerable "Got My Mo-Jo Working” and Ellie Greenwich/Jeff Barry’s “She Ain’t No Angel.” He wandered from label to label until 1966, when he signed with Decca Records as a country artist. A new string of hits resulted, including 36 #1 hits into the late 1980s. The rest…is hysteria.
Tomorrow: a wild, weird single by r&b group Andy and The Marglows, featuring a pre-emptive first version of a future pop hit…by another artist. Atmospheric and odd; a beautiful thing from 1963.

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