CHARTSTADTS Part 3 (DON'T CRY NOW: 1973-74)

[erik]

Although 1973 was a year in which Linda underwent a lot of turbulence in her personal life, it was also a year that she made a lot of changes to the way she did things as a singer and a musician. During the summer of 1972, she had jumped ship from Capitol over to David Geffen's newly formed Asylum label, which had gained national prominence through the Eagles' shockingly successful debut album. Later that year, and on into 1973, she worked long and hard on what would become her seventh album overall, Don't Cry Now, whose title came from a song on the album by her new "beau", Detroit-born but Texas-raised J.D. Souther, whom she referred to for many years thereafter as “the love of my life.”

In the months it took to do the album, Linda went out on another arduous tour as the opening act for Neil Young, for whom she had lent her patented backing vocals to on his #1 hit “Heart Of Gold” in ‘72; and while this was better than many of her past tours (where she opened for Alice Cooper and the Doors), she was still exposed to the often-harsh reaction of Neil's audiences, which sometimes incensed even Neil. Still, a lot of good things came out of it. During a stopover in Houston, she caught up with her erratic country-rock compatriot Gram Parsons and his Fallen Angels, which included a young Birmingham, Alabama native named Emmylou Harris. Linda had never heard of Emmy before this time, but Emmy certainly knew of Linda, having seen her perform at the Bitter End in New York in the summer of 1969 and also having been blown away by her. Linda joined Emmy and Gram onstage for a rendering of "Sin City", and a Mutual Admiration Society was formed between the two women that would continue right up to the present day. Following Gram's death at the end of the summer of 1973, Linda invited Emmy back out to L.A. and basically acted as her de facto agent in getting Emmy a record contract of her own. Needless to say, she was very persuasive, since Emmy was signed to Warner Brothers in 1974.

In the meantime, Linda managed to finish Don't Cry Now, but it did cost her a lot--a whopping $150,000.



Both Souther and John Boylan shared production duties on the album, which caused more than a little personal conflict because of who was caught in the middle. Thankfully, however, help came to Linda in the way of Peter Asher, a bespectacled red-haired Brit who had first gained his reputation as one-half of the British folk/pop duo Peter and Gordon with their numerous hits between 1964 and 1967, including a version of Paul McCartney's "World Without Love", which was #1 on both sides of the Atlantic. He was already managing and producing for James Taylor, and would have worked with Linda sooner had he not also been producing James' younger sister Kate. When Kate Taylor decided to let go of the scene for a while, Asher was open to Linda, and he stepped in to help her finish the album.

Released in September 1973, Don't Cry Now, for all the turbulence that went into its production, would be what sparked Linda's career, as it reached a very respectable #45 on the Billboard Top 200 Album Chart, staying there for 56 weeks (and also getting to #5 on the Billboard C&W Album Chart). Elements of the long-lost Memphis and Muscle Shoals sessions of 1970-71 crept in on songs like the Eagles' "Desperado" and the gut-wrenching Bill Williams/Booker T. Jones composition "Everybody Loves A Winner", where R&B-style horn arrangements were prominent, clearly marking Linda's love for the R&B sound of those two Deep South locales. In general, though, the sound was largely straightforward country-rock, as personified by the first single released from it later that fall.

LOVE HAS NO PRIDE
12/01/73--#99 (her sixth Hot 100 entry)
12/08/73--#92
12/15/73--#81
12/22/73--#68
12/29/73--#58
01/05/74--#54
01/12/74--#51
01/19/74--#59
01/26/74--#59
02/02/74--#63
02/09/74--#74

Although Bonnie Raitt had already recorded this Eric Kaz/Libby Titus composition, it was Linda's aching, torchy rendition that became a minor chart hit and a fan favorite during the winter of 1973-74 (it also peaked at #23 on the Adult Contemporary chart). It was drenched in the almost synthesizer-like steel guitar mastery of Sneaky Pete Kleinow, and featured soulful backing vocals from Ginger and Mary Holliday, who had also worked with Elvis on some of his Memphis recordings for Chips Moman in 1969, in essence making this a cross between those recordings and Linda's.

But Linda was still not through. She revived a song that she had recorded back in 1969 for Hand Sown, Home Grown, but had not been happy with the results back then. This time was a little different, and a breakthrough single was the end result.

SILVER THREADS AND GOLDEN NEEDLES
04/06/74--#98 (her seventh Hot 100 entry)
04/13/74--#95
04/20/74--#86
04/27/74--#83
05/04/74--#74
05/11/74--#67
05/18/74--#70

Fueled by her former Swampwater fiddle player Gib Guilbeau and the piercing steel guitar work of Goose Creek Symphony member Ed Black, this version of the oft-covered C&W standard was not only a minor pop hit, but also represented her first penetration of Billboard's C&W singles chart, where it peaked at #20 in May 1974. The success of "Silver Threads" on the country charts could be attributed in no small measure to a lot of West Coast country radio outlets, whose ideas of country music were frequently to the left of Music City.

With Peter Asher now her sole producer and manager, Linda continued to assert herself. During this period, after years of being intimidated by other guys, Linda started sharpening up her acoustic guitar skills, which helped her immensely in both getting the sound of the band right and showing how professional a musician she was. Occasionally strumming rhythm, Linda was otherwise displaying her finger-picking prowess on songs like "Long Long Time", "Crazy Arms", and an ultra-unplugged version of "It Doesn't Matter Anymore" that she did with then-current Eagle and longtime friend Bernie Leadon on an episode of Don Kirshner's Rock Concert in early 1974.





And in the summer of 1974, Linda and Peter, together with her new band mates Andrew Gold and Bob Warford, and her one-time Stone Poney partner Kenny Edwards, got into the studio to do the album that would not only conclude her contract with Capitol, but, when released that November, would catapult her to national stardom. That part of the story will be looked at next.

[sliderocker]

Great reading on everything so far, Erik. I actually thought Linda did a little better with "Love Has No Pride" than what she did although it may be the song's lack of better chart success had less to do with sales than with radio airplay. I remember the song received airplay in the smaller markets where I lived and little to none in the major larger markets. That had to hurt the chart positions for the song and I just wonder how well the song did in the other large markets around the country? LHNP deserved a better chart showing than 51 and it just boggles the mind why it didn't at least make Top 20, given all the other songs that made the Top 20 in late '73 and early '74.

[erik]

I think the modest success of "Love Has No Pride" was due to the fact that her audience had not quite caught up with her country-rock sound just yet, though that audience was growing substantially in 1973, particularly in the last three months of the year after Don't Cry Now was released.

A lot of the radio airplay for "Love Has No Pride" came from West Coast radio stations for the more obvious reasons that she was based out here, and because the country-rock sound was most prominent in those markets. And it was primarily a more progressive FM-listening audience she was getting, whereas most of the Hot 100 chart action at the time was still an AM thing. When it came to "Silver Threads And Golden Needles", of course, that's where she broke into the country radio market, again largely because of West Coast country radio stations, which tended to be a bit more divergent from their counterparts in the South.

Anyway, one can't always judge an artist's success only on radio airplay and chart action. The truth is, Linda's prominence was growing nationally by the number of TV appearances she was making, and her concerts (including her debut at the Roxy in West Hollywood on October 31, 1973). It was only a matter of time before that prominence exploded into superstardom.