Hurtin' Country Songs

Although stars like Bing Crosby had found connections between country and pop before, the early-1960s success of disparate artists such as Patsy Cline and Ray Charles definitively proved the crossover potential of countrypolitan. Soon after Charles's 1962 classic Modern Sounds in Country and Western Music broke through, pop singer Dean Martin finally decided to tackle country music, and did so across several albums for Reprise. These 15 songs represent a compelling cross section of his country recordings. Jimmy Bowen's busy arrangements sometimes cross the line between tasteful and tacky, but Martin is never nonplussed, which of course is his appeal to begin with. His confident, distinctive vocals meshed well with the genre's direct emotional communication. Whereas Cline's powerful voice may have conveyed raw pain and heartache, Martin's offhand manner conveys a more subtle resignation and disaffection that's effective in its own way.