Having been the undeniable draw of the Ike & Tina Turner Revue, Tina was destined to go solo, at some point... which was Ike's biggest fear and, indeed, the reason he dubbed her “Tina Turner” to begin with... and trademarked the name. So, in 1974, he brought in Tom Thacker from Nashville to produce her first project without him... the Grammy-nominated Tina Turns the Country On! (In a likely show of the country establishment's racism, the album was in the Best R&B Vocal Performance category.)
But this IS a country record, despite any protestations from the so-called “purists.” Like Beyoncé 50 years later, Tina ticked every box of country cred, starting with growing up, quite literally, dirt poor in Tennessee. It's not her fault she was so talented that she would go on to become the Queen of Rock & Roll. Listen to this and tell me it ain't country... and if Hank Snow has ever sounded cooler.
From the opening strains of “Bayou Song,” the main difference between this album and its predecessors – other than the instrumentation – is the vocal restraint. It's hard to know, with as much hindsight as we now have, if that was due to fatigue, force, or some other factor. But the effect, coming from one of the most powerful voices in history, is mesmerizing.
Billboard wrote at the time of its release, “On this effort, she flexes her voice from its softest to its usual rough tone and molds it perfectly around each cut. Drawing from a wide range of composers from Dylan to Dolly Parton to Kris Kristofferson to Hank Snow. ...Surprisingly effective are the slow cuts, and Tina proves just as adept an interpreter of other's material as she is a singer of original songs.” Thanks to a digital release in late 2023, we can now all revel in the queen's country majesty.
Hear the whole episode on May 6 at 6 am, 12 pm, and 6 pm PT.
