My 100 Favorite Charted Country Songs: City Lights

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When I started this list I wanted to limit myself to no more than three songs by any one artist. Today I’ll introduce you to the man who could have easily had four songs on the list (and waddaya know, it’s NOT Jim Reeves! ). And to think, I didn’t like him when I was a kid! (True story.) All of these are “Linda? NO!” songs, but this one is “Linda? NO!!”ier. City Lights - Ray Price I basically learned to read because of Ray Price. We had a 45 of “Burning Memories” when I was little, and I didn’t like it. The record label (the old yellow and black Columbia label) looked the same as Carl Smith’s “Why, Why” (which I loved), so I had to differentiate between the two! (Happy ending: both Price and Smith are on this list.) A couple of years ago I wrote about going to music spots in Georgia. One was Athens, home of R.E.M. and the B-52’s. The other was Commerce, Georgia, a tiny town not too far from Athens. It was in Commerce that a 19-year-old journalism major and country music fan/disc jockey sat on the roof of a three-story hotel (“the tallest building in Commerce”), looked over the sleepy town, and wrote, “A bright array of city lights as far as I can see.” Thus began the Hall of Fame songwriting career of Bill Anderson (who wrote yesterday’s song). By then (1958), Ray Price was already established as a star. This was his third #1 song. The essence of country music to me. I still get goose bumps when that mournful fiddle work by Tommy Jackson starts up. Oh, and for you people who aren’t well-versed in southern, “purty picture” is pretty picture. City Lights Written by Bill Anderson Recorded by Ray Price Released as a single, 1958 Peak chart position: #1 Today’s rock song: “Dream Lover” Forget her name in a different atmosphere: