Sometimes a Memory Ain't Enough
Sometimes a Memory Ain't Enough | ||||
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Studio album by Jerry Lee Lewis | ||||
Released | 1973 | |||
Recorded | Nashville, Tennessee | |||
Genre | Country | |||
Length | 32:11 | |||
Label | Mercury | |||
Producer | Stan Kesler | |||
Jerry Lee Lewis chronology | ||||
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Sometimes a Memory Ain't Enough is an album by Jerry Lee Lewis released on Mercury Records in 1973.
Background
The title song, "Sometimes a Memory Ain't Enough", was another Top 10 for Lewis, peaking at number 6 on the Billboard country singles chart on December 8, 1973 after 14 weeks on the chart.[1] Lewis gives committed performances, although producer Stan Kesler's growing penchant of sweetening the sound with strings and backing vocalists diluted some of the harder edges that were evident on Jerry Lee's earlier country albums like Another Place, Another Time and Touching Home. It kept Lewis competitive on the radio, however, and the Stan Kesler-penned title track rose to number 6. Although Lewis had released the rocking The Session...Recorded in London with Great Artists earlier in the year, one listen to his new LP revealed that he had not turned his back on his country audience. He gives a moving performance on George Jones's "What My Woman Can't Do" and covers fellow pianist Leon Russell's lonely lament "My Cricket and Me." The rollicking "I'm Left, You're Right, She's Gone" was released as a second single and but did not crack the Top 20.
Grand Ole Opry
The release of Sometimes a Memory Ain't Enough followed not long after Lewis's first ever appearance on the Grand Ole Opry on January 20, 1973. Although Lewis had scored 14 Top 10 country hits since 1968 (including four chart toppers), "the Killer" had never been asked to perform at the hallowed Opry. As Colin Escott notes in the liner notes to A Half Century of Hits, Lewis had always maintained ambivalent feelings towards Music City ever since he'd been turned away as an aspiring musician before his glory days at Sun Records: "It was 18 years since he had left Nashville broke and disheartened...But for all the success (65 country hits at last counting), Lewis was never truly accepted in Nashville. He didn’t move there and didn’t schmooze there. He didn’t fit in with the family values crowd. Lewis family values weren’t necessarily worse, but they were different." When Lewis finally took the stage, he broke just about every rule the Opry had. As recounted in a 2015 online Rolling Stone article by Beville Dunkerley, Lewis opened with his comeback single "Another Place, Another Time" and then announced to the audience, "Let me tell ya something about Jerry Lee Lewis, ladies and gentlemen: I am a rock and rollin', country-and-western, rhythm and blues-singin' motherfucker!"[2] Ignoring his allotted time constraints - and, thus, commercial breaks - Lewis played for 40 minutes (the average Opry performance is two songs, for about eight maximum minutes of stage time) and invited Del Wood - the one member of the Opry who had been kind to him when he had been there as a teenager - out on stage to sing with him. He also blasted through "Whole Lotta Shakin' Going On," "Workin' Man Blues," "Good Golly Miss Molly," and a host of others classics before leaving the stage to a thunderous standing ovation.
Track listing
No. | Title | Writer(s) | Length |
---|---|---|---|
1. | "Sometimes a Memory Ain't Enough" | Stan Kesler | 2:56 |
2. | "Ride Me Down Easy" | Billy Joe Shaver | 2:50 |
3. | "Mama's Hands" |
| 3:46 |
4. | "What My Woman Can't Do" |
| 2:29 |
5. | "My Cricket and Me" | Leon Russell | 2:11 |
6. | "I'm Left, You're Right, She's Gone" |
| 2:21 |
7. | "Honky Tonk Wine" | Mack Vickery | 4:37 |
8. | "Falling to the Bottom" | 2:38 | |
9. | "I Think I Need to Pray" |
| 2:45 |
10. | "Mornin' After Baby Let Me Down" | Ray Griff | 3:01 |
11. | "Keep Me from Blowing Away" | Paul Craft | 2:37 |
Total length: | 32:11 |
References
- v
- t
- e
- Jerry Lee Lewis
- Jerry Lee's Greatest!
- Golden Hits of Jerry Lee Lewis
- The Return of Rock
- Country Songs for City Folks
- Memphis Beat
- Soul My Way
- Another Place, Another Time
- She Still Comes Around
- Sings the Country Music Hall of Fame Hits, Vol. 1
- Sings the Country Music Hall of Fame Hits, Vol. 2
- The Golden Cream of the Country
- She Even Woke Me Up to Say Goodbye
- In Loving Memories: The Jerry Lee Lewis Gospel Album
- There Must Be More to Love Than This
- Touching Home
- Would You Take Another Chance on Me?
- The Killer Rocks On
- Who's Gonna Play This Old Piano?
- The Session...Recorded in London with Great Artists
- Sometimes a Memory Ain't Enough
- Southern Roots: Back Home to Memphis
- I-40 Country
- Boogie Woogie Country Man
- Odd Man In
- Country Class
- Country Memories
- Jerry Lee Keeps Rockin'
- Jerry Lee Lewis
- When Two Worlds Collide
- Killer Country
- My Fingers Do the Talkin'
- I Am What I Am
- Young Blood
- Last Man Standing
- Mean Old Man
- Rock & Roll Time
- Together (with Linda Gail Lewis)
- Million Dollar Quartet (with Johnny Cash, Carl Perkins and Elvis Presley)
- The Survivors Live (with Johnny Cash and Carl Perkins)
- Class of '55 (with Johnny Cash, Carl Perkins and Roy Orbison)
- Live at the Star Club, Hamburg
- The Greatest Live Show on Earth
- By Request: More of the Greatest Live Show on Earth
- Live at the International, Las Vegas
- Last Man Standing Live
- Jamboree (1957)
- American Hot Wax (1978)
- Great Balls of Fire! (1989)
- Dick Tracy (1990)
- Original Golden Hits, Vol. 1
- Original Golden Hits, Vol. 2
- Rockin' Rhythm and Blues
- A Taste of Country
- Best of Jerry Lee Lewis
- All Killer, No Filler: The Anthology
- A Whole Lotta...Jerry Lee Lewis: The Definitive Retrospective
- "Another Place, Another Time"
- "Baby Baby Bye Bye"
- "Baby, Hold Me Close"
- "Break-Up"
- "Breathless"
- "Chantilly Lace"
- "Cold, Cold Heart"
- "Come as You Were"
- "Crown Victoria Custom '51"
- "Crazy Arms"
- "Don't Let Me Cross Over" (with Linda Gail Lewis)
- "Down the Line"
- "End of the Road"
- "Fools like Me"
- "Great Balls of Fire"
- "Hi-Heel Sneakers"
- "High School Confidential"
- "How's My Ex Treating You"
- "I Can't Seem to Say Goodbye"
- "I'll Make It All Up to You"
- "I'm on Fire"
- "I'm So Lonesome I Could Cry"
- "In the Mood"
- "Invitation to Your Party"
- "It'll Be Me"
- "Jackson" (with Linda Gail Lewis)
- "Lewis Boogie"
- "Me and Bobby McGee"
- "Meat Man"
- "Money (That's What I Want)"
- "Old Black Joe"
- "Once More with Feeling"
- "One Has My Name (The Other Has My Heart)"
- "One Minute Past Eternity"
- "Pen and Paper"
- "She Even Woke Me Up to Say Goodbye"
- "She Still Comes Around (To Love What's Left of Me)"
- "She Was My Baby (He Was My Friend)"
- "Sixteen Candles"
- "Somewhere Over the Rainbow"
- "Seasons of My Heart"
- "Sweet Little Sixteen"
- "Teenage Letter"
- "There Must Be More to Love Than This"
- "To Make Love Sweeter for You"
- "Touching Home"
- "Turn On Your Love Light"
- "What's Made Milwaukee Famous (Has Made a Loser Out of Me)"
- "What'd I Say"
- "When He Walks on You (Like You Have Walked On Me)"
- "Whole Lotta Shakin' Goin' On"
- "Who's Gonna Play This Old Piano?"
- "Wild One"
- "Would You Take Another Chance on Me"
- "You Win Again"
- Jamboree (1957)
- High School Confidential (1958)
- Be My Guest (1965)
- 33⅓ Revolutions per Monkee (1969)
- American Hot Wax (1978)
- Myra Gale Brown (cousin/wife)
- Linda Gail Lewis (sister)
- Mickey Gilley (cousin)
- Carl McVoy (cousin)
- Jimmy Swaggart (double first cousin)
- Discography
- Great Balls of Fire!
- Jerry Lee Lewis: Trouble in Mind
- Walk the Line
- Jerry Kennedy
- Kenny Lovelace
- Mack Vickery