Carnival Saloon regulars with long memories will know that I love 'answer songs'. In my recent post about Wanda Jackson's My Big Iron Skillet I mentioned Kitty Wells' 1952 single It Wasn't God Who Made Honky Tonk Angels, which was an answer song to Hank Thompson's The Wild Side of Life.
What I didn't know until someone commented about that post on Facebook was that Kitty's second big hit Paying For That Back Street Affair was an answer song to the Webb Pierce track Back Street Affair. (If the name Webb Pierce means nothing to you watch this rendition of There Stands The Glass - one of my all-time favourite country songs).
Here are both of Kitty's songs and the gents who unwittingly inspired them.
MP3: Hank Thompson - The Wild Side of Life
Buy Hank Thomson - Vintage Collections at Amazon
MP3: Kitty Wells - It Wasn't God That Made Honky Tonk Angels
Buy Kitty Wells - The Collection at Amazon
MP3: Webb Pierce - Back Street Affair
Buy Webb Pierce - More And More at Amazon
MP3: Kitty Wells - Paying For That Back Street Affair
Buy Kitty Wells - The Collection at Amazon
Kitty Wells, by the way, is still alive. She's 91! Her entry in Wikipedia provides a thorough overview for those wanting to find out more about this country music pioneer.
Do tell me what you make of these tracks and if you have any favourite answer songs I might not know please leave a comment below.
Related Links
King of the Road, Queen of the House - another pair of classic answer songs
Wanda Jackson - My Big Iron Skillet - fantastic protofeminist twang
4 comments:
Love the Kitty Wells song which I first heard on the Cerys Matthews 6music show, the same route I found your blog.
Keep up the good work with the blog, I'll try and check back regularly.
Thanks Chopper. Cerys' show is always a treat. Of all 6 Music shows (and I like most of them) I think the music she plays is most in tune with my taste.
Do keep up with the blog. I've actually discovered another Kitty Wells answer song over the weekend so will post that too at some point.
Many thanks for this. Dunno if you've heard that the wonderful Laura Cantrell is about to release an album of Kitty covers, plus one new song, a demo of which is at http://www.davidbelbin.com/2011/03/laura-cantrell/
She's touring the UK next month.
David - I meant to add a note about Laura Cantrell's new album. Should be good. I have tickets for her gig at the Union Chapel in London.
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