Mickey Gilley - The Songs We Made Love To (1979/2022)

In 1979, Mickey Gilley's final album for Playboy was folded into Epic, who manufactured and distributed the label. Produced by Foster & Rice, The Songs We Made Love To was produced in Pasadena, TX, at Gilley's home studio, and feels so far out of Nash Vegas that it's a real country honky tonk record (only Vern Gosdin was making them in Tennessee). The title track opens the set with a beautiful mid-tempo country ballad before being rocked into "Bye Bye Baby," with Gilley pumpin' the box against a backdrop of pedal steel, a telecaster, and the Jordanaires singing doo wop in the background. And the Texas swing barroom twist of "Jr. P Jones" is a story Merle Haggard could've written, but with Gilley's amazing baritone wrapped around it, it feels like a cross between Jerry Lee and Bob Wills. But even on the string-laden ballads like "Lonely Wine," the R&B influence seeps into the mix and country and soul dance close and sexy. "Just Long Enough to Say Goodbye" is one of Gilley's wonderful theatrical songs, beginning soft and simple and slowly transforming itself into a large orchestrated torch song felt best by barroom light before shifting into overdrive for "Tonight I'll Help You Say Goodbye Again," all torched out with full-on rockabilly swagger and honky tonk blues criss-crossing in the refrain. Nobody but nobody, not even Ray Price in all his genius, can put together a full body of diverse material like Mickey Gilley can, and in 1979 he was still at the height of his powers. Between his smooth style and his complete immersion in all styles of country, blues, early rock & roll, and R&B, he could meld smooth and sweet or sweaty and sassy and still make a listener feel they were at the center of whatever party or tearfest was being thrown usually on the same album; and this one is just an outing.