I just saw that Billy Sherrill, who produced Elvis Costello’s Almost Blue, has passed away.
As a somewhat love-sick 17 year old, I was very taken with Mr Costello’s version of Sweet Dreams. As I recall, the single had a cover of Jack Kittel’s Psycho on the B-side. I liked that too, but not because I was love-sick.
Almost Blue was my gateway to Patsy Cline and Gram Parsons and it is still one of my favourite Elvis Costello albums. There’s a documentary (Edit: I see it’s the South Bank Show) about the making of Almost Blue, which I remember as being good. I see it’s on YouTube, so that’s my next hour sorted.
Billy Sherrill also co-wrote Stand By Your Man. I find Tammy Wynette’s version a bit cloying, but I like Lyle Lovett’s. I was going to pop that in here too, but I don’t know if I can, so I will (try to) be the first to comment on my own post and put it there.
and here’s Lyle.
What appears to be a Korean YouTube post, showing some men, presumably to be stood by.
Was very cynical and dismissive when the Attractions came to town to record. Not sure he was very co-operative.
What did surprise me was when I recently bought the extended live Staples record Freedom Highway, it was Billy Sherill that recorded the show at the New Nazareth Church in Chicago in 1965
https://youtu.be/Oa1VkOmj0c8
Elvis said that Sherrill couldn’t see why they wanted to record what he thought of as a bunch of tired old songs
Well American country producers, particularly back then, are only interested in radio lays and hits, and Sherill probably thought a bunch of old country songs recorded traditionally wouldn’t garner either. Were any if the tracks hits in the US? Of course Good Year was a hit here so what does Billy Sherill know?
No, career torpedoed by the Columbus incident so he was off mainstream radar at that point (and probably until Veronica in 1989)
Probably my favourite EC album too. Loved it at the time and it still sounds good now.
Saw that show he did at the Albert hall when almost blue came out. Strings an all.
Think I’ve got that album in cassette,vinyl,cd, and expanded /enhanced.
“Billy Sherrill, who produced Elvis Costello’s Almost Blue…”
That’s a bit like saying “Paul McCartney, who played drums on ‘Picasso’s Last Words’…”
Fatima,
Fair enough. You’re right.
P
Billy has some history. Involved at the very start of the Muscle Shoals scene for example. It took me a while to appreciate his take on the Nashville Sound but these days I love it. Particularly his work with the great Charlie Rich.
Yep. He was the first of Rick Hall’s long list of soon-to-be-former partners.
Well said, Fatima. I read a biography of Tammy Wynette recently (I know) and Sherrill was as important in that country scene as Sam Phillips was for rock and roll. He wrote or co-wrote many great songs, including one of my all-time favourites ‘Almost Persuaded’ and worked with enormous talents like George Jones and Charlie Rich.
Like most of the planet, he had little regard for Costello, disliking his voice.
*buzz* incorrect but thanks for playing
No need to apologise for having a taste for Tammitude. I saw her live in the Eighties. Although at the time she was recuperating from yet another surgical intervention for her “stummick prarlms”, her singing was sublime. Without doubt one of the best female vocalists I’ve ever seen (and I’ve seen Ella and K.D; Tammy was definitely up there).
Not unlike dear, dear Cilla, she had two basic voices, which we might call “the whimper” and “the belt”. Absolutely unlike Cilla, though, she switched between the two artfully and seamlessly.
Never saw her live, but always liked her since “Stind by your man” was a hit in the 70s. What a voice. Funnily enough I found myself singing “I don’t want to play house” only a few days ago. With George they were the greatest duo (cue thread…).
I saw her and George at Ham Odeon in the ’90s. Their duet albums are big favourites of mine. Oddly enough, I got turned onto them when on holiday in St Lucia in the late ’70s. The midday radio show there was a solid 2 hours of old-style C&W. George Jones, Jim Reeves, Tammy were all huge there.
The book I read is by the biographer of Neil Young ( he wrote ‘Shakey). It all became a bit depressingly trailer trash near the end. She died (was purposefully overdosed?), lying on her couch at home. Her widower, a 24 carat scumbag, then thought to throw a party. Very rapidly, the house was filled with people drinking and partying hard. During this time, her corpse remained on the sofa for at least five hours while the festivities continued. Sick or what?