Have You Never Been Mellow review
Grooves Narrow Between Country Twang, Pop
By Dale Anderson
THAT OLD DIRT ROAD between country music and the popular mainstream is rapidly getting paved over.
Sometimes the intentions behind the paving are good-like when old standbys like master fiddler Vassar Clements bridges tastes and generations by sitting in with Duane Allman, Charlie Daniels and their Southern rock cohorts.
And sometimes the intentions are blatantly commercial which is why numerous established country artists quit the Country Music Assn. in protest last fall after its big awards went to an Australian-born pop singer from England- Olivia Newton-John.
AS FOR Olivia Newton-John, she’s gone from mountain sweetheart to Breck girl on her new “Have You Never Been Mellow” (MCA Records MCA-2133).
It’s a very pleasant album Olivia recounting some recent hits like John Denver’s “Goodbye Again” and singing another country song with a synthesizer riff, “Water Under The Bridge” but ultimately it becomes unsatifying, like watered-down champagne.
On a test of two would-be Olivias Jessie Colter’s “I’m Jessie Colter” (Capitol ST-11363) and Rachel Faro’s “Refugees” (RCA CPL-1-0689) - my favorite Top 40 consultant chose Colter over even Newton-John.