THE LINER NOTES

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By the time of the release of this eighth album for Columbia, Lynn Anderson had become nothing less than a household name. “Rose Garden” had become one of the biggest and most successful signature songs of any singer’s career, and its chorus the inspiration for the US Marines. She’d been voted Top Female Vocalist twice by the Academy of Country Music, and in 1971, won not only her first Grammy for Best Female Country Vocal Performance, but also the coveted Best Female Vocalist of the Year by the Country Music Association. Along with husband and producer Glenn Sutton, the two were Nashville’s undisputed Power Couple, turning everything they touched to gold.

 

Released just four months after her smash LP, ‘Cry’, ‘Listen to a Country Song’ moves ever-so-slightly to the right of that album’s pop-centric feel, with an eleven song set of tracks that tend closer to country and rock. Jim Messina’s (of Loggins and Messina) title track, "Listen to a Country Song" sets the stage with a backbeat driven by Pig Robbins’ barrel-house piano. “Fool Me”, another original from the Joe South catalog, and the album’s second single, is pure Lynn Anderson Countrypolitan, and Tim Hardin’s “Reason To Believe” takes on an acoustic country feel with Marc Casstevens’ gut string guitars weaving throughout Lynn’s restrained and tenderhearted vocal.

 

Peaking at #3 on the Billboard charts, and launching two top 5 singles, ‘Listen To a Country Song’ does more than just extend the Lynn Anderson streak; it firmly establishes her as a genuine superstar.

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J. Buck Ford