Customer Reviews

Side By Side

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Originally issued in 1992 on the Step One label as "Memories That Last," these tracks represent the only duets on record by two country superstars known for their transitions from honky-tonk to pop. By the early 90s, Price's recording career was mostly given over to live performance in Branson, and Young's 40-year run of hits had wound down. Though Young was stricken with a career-ending case of emphysema a couple of years after these sessions, it's not evidenced here. Both he and Price were still in good voice, and if not as creative or imaginative as earlier in their careers, still engaged by the songs and each other.

Accompanied by Nashville A-listers like Buddy Emmons on pedal steel and Jimmy Capps on guitar, Price and Young stuck mostly to the pop balladry of their later careers, dipping into the canons of Dean Martin ("Everybody Love Somebody" and "Side By Side"), Nat "King" Cole ("Somewhere Along the Way," "Walkin' My Baby Back Home" and "When I Fall in Love"), and generally staying in the middle of the road. When the singers turned to material from Hank Williams Sr. ("Cold, Cold Heart" and "Mansion on the Hill") and Willie Nelson ("Funny How Time Slips Away"), there was a sense of the innovation they'd found earlier in crossing pop influences into country music: the strings dropped away, Emmons' steel guitar cried and the two-step rhythms provided contrast to the crooned vocals. The playful rivalry of "Too Big to Fight" and wistful memories of "Whole Lot of You" also found a nice balance between country sentimentality and pop style.

Varese's CD reissue adds four bonus tracks taken from individual Step One albums on which the artists re-recorded their earlier hits. These don't really compare to the originals, and they're lacking the novelty of the duets. The original album is sufficiently unique to merit a spin, but in the twilight of their recording careers, neither artist was the powerhouse they'd once been. [©2007 hyperbolium dot com]

Originally issued as "The Memories That Last," this Faron Young - Ray Price duets album would be the only time these two Country Music Hall of Fame legends would record together.

This CD features an outstanding mixture of country standards along with some of the finest pop songs ever written like "Funny How Time Slips Away," " Cold, Cold Heart," "Walking My Baby Back Home" and "Side by Side." Also included are four solo bonus tracks that were not on the original release.

The album was produced by Ray Pennington (Waylon Jennings, Norma Jean, Billy Walker and Kenny Price).

Featured on this release are major Nashville sideman Clinton Gregory, Buddy Emmons, and Jimmy Capps among others.

Not as good as I had hoped, but with these two you can't really go wrong.