Classic Conway is one of those various "best of" collections that record labels liked to issue on artists from time to time. Today, artist's have way more control over their album releases and you don't see as many compilation's being released year after year from record label's. The buying public, for the most part, looks down on greatest hits and best-of albums now-a-days because they feel it's a way for a record label to make money with previously released material. In the past, this wasn't the normal point of view, and so independent and small record labels could get away with releasing compilation albums and greatest hits albums on major label artist's and the fans didn't seem to mind it...most of the time these best-of collections featured an eye-catching album cover, which would really be what drew sales, if any, since the material was already available on previous albums. You don't see that many completists today, either. A completist is someone wants to own just about every release that was put out on a specific artist, regardless of the fact that they are duplicating their inventory with multiple copies of songs they already have. A completist would want Classic Conway to add to their collection...and as I was referring to earlier, it features an eye-catching picture of Conway performing on stage. 
The album features 10 songs and not all of them were major Top-10 singles, either. Due to the album not being called "greatest hits", it doesn't contain only Top-10 singles. Here is a list of the songs highlighted on this album...released by MCA during Conway's stay on Warner Brothers. A lot of the songs on this collection were still recurrent's on the radio when this album was issued. A recurrent is a song that is still being played even though it's reached it's popularity peak on the weekly music charts.
1. Tight Fittin' Jeans; 1981
2. I Can't Believe She Gives It All To Me; 1977
3. Play, Guitar Play; 1977
4. The Grandest Lady of Them All; 1978
5. We Had It All; 1981**
6. Georgia Keeps Pulling On My Ring; 1978
7. Your Love Had Taken Me That High; 1978
8. Over Thirty But Not Over The Hill; 1981**
9. I Am The Dreamer, You Are the Dream; 1980
10. Red Neckin' Love Makin' Night; 1981
**-tracks number 5 and 8 were released as singles by MCA in 1983 and 1982 and they were on the charts competing with the contemporary singles he was releasing on Warner Brothers. "We Had It All" reached the Top-50 and "Over Thirty" hit the Top-70. I imagine radio stations in 1983 were sent copies of the single in the mail and they played "We Had It All" and loved it and kept on playing it even though it wasn't his official single. I do not know what Conway or Warner Brothers had to say about it...since Conway was known to only focus on whatever song and album he had out at the time. "We Had It All" received some hefty airplay considering it wasn't Conway's official single. It almost became a Top-40 hit as a result...I happen to think radio played this song in protest of "The Rose". Although "The Rose" was a #1 single in early 1983 for Conway, critic's didn't particularly like the idea of Conway doing remakes of contemporary pop songs.
"Slow Hand" became one of Conway's biggest hit singles of 1982, defying the grumblings from a lot of music critics wondering if Conway had lost his mind recording the song. The song had been a pop hit for The Pointer Sisters just a few months prior to Conway recording his version. Conway's version was a #1 single for two weeks. In spite of this success with that pop remake, "The Rose" in particular, drew the biggest complaints from critics as well as from radio stations that didn't want to play a country version of a pop song...and this was Conway's second such release when you consider "Slow Hand".
So, I think radio played "We Had It All" as a song they preferred...which could explain why it hit the mid 40's on the charts...most unofficial singles don't get the kind of airplay to really climb the charts but that single did. Not long after this, Conway released back-to-back singles of pop remakes: "Heartache Tonight" and "Three Times a Lady". Those two singles, however, would be the last. He never again released his versions of pop songs to radio...although a few of his future albums would contain his take on contemporary pop songs.
No comments:
Post a Comment