Despite her name, Patsy Cline proved she was "nobody's patsy" throughout her career. In a time when the Nashville music business treated female acts as pretty window dressings or chattel, she demanded and rightfully garnered deep-seated esteem. Concert promoters were known for cheating artists out of their stipends at the time by promising to pay up after shows and running with the money during the concert. Cline stood up to male promoters before she even took the stage, demanded their money by claiming: "No dough, no show."
That type of obstinate showmanship was reflected in her stentorian voice, a peeled-back husk, a full-throated contralto that stood in marked contrast to the light, prairie-wind vocals of other female country musicians. Cline described her vocal stylings matter-of-factly: “Oh, I just sing like I hurt inside." And there was plenty of hurt going around for female musicians in what many still consider a male dominated industry. Cline certainly opened up the doors for the big name country-pop starlets like Tammy Wynette, Loretta Lynn, and in recent years LeAnn Rimes and Trisha Yearwood. When she made her first recordings in 1955, Kitty Wells was the reigning “Queen of Country Music." By the time Cline broke through as a durable hit maker in 1961, a year before her untimely plane crash, she had taken the throne.
Her third and final album, Sentimentally Yours, sounds more like a melodic capstone on a career and less like an extension of a star’s brief dust trail. This was exacerbated by her continued augurs of impending doom in the months and weeks leading up to her death at age 30. The crash is surpassed by the music with every listen though.
Cline's early days in rockabilly are hinted at in some of her winking deliveries and turns of phrases, but for the most part, Sentimentally Yours is a subtle fusion of sharp populism and C&W gravitas. Similar to her self-titled debut and Showcase, Cline demonstrates her eye for picking choice cuts, from Hank Williams to the staple muse for her countrypolitan material, Hank Cochran.
Despite appearances, Cline wasn’t afraid to rend her heart for the public eye; in fact, she found herself steeped in unabashed nostalgia with the songs she chose to front on Yours. Her final mega-hit “Heartaches” matches her previous two singles (57's “Walkin’ After Midnight” and 61's #1 hit “I Fall to Pieces”) pound-for-pound with the simplest of instrumentation. She doesn’t hide behind any production or backup orchestration. An upright bass, a doleful steel guitar, spongy drums, and a tinkling bar piano courtesy of Nashville mainstay Floyd Cramer fill the small spaces that Cline’s powerful voice doesn’t manage to reach. The setup reveals a bravery in short supply in or out of the Nashville canon.
At various times throughout Yours, influential record producer Owen Bradley's production seems to have one foot in pop, jump-blues, or early rock ‘n' roll. He created a sound all its own; countrypolitan. Today it's colloquially known as country pop or derisively as Bud Light country, but Bradley did it before any co-optation.
“She’s Got You” was the perfect epitome of that sound. It reached #1 on the country charts and remained perched just outside the pop Top 10. Patsy’s phrasing on this torch ballad is unimpeachable, as she lists off all the ephemera as if she’s crying before a bonfire, recalling her old flame. She gets through a signed "I Love You" portrait, old records, and a class ring before singing the clincher: “The only thing different/ The only thing new/ I’ve got your (picture/records/little things)/ She’s got you.” The last line is stretched out until it's unbearable. It's those kinds of moments that truly make Sentimentally Yours a triumph.
Naturally, Cline's pedigree was firmly planted in the nourishing sustenance of country and western music, and Sentimentally Yours features two songs, “Heartaches” and “Anytime,” that became C&W staples in their own right. Penned in the 1930s, "Heartaches" was probably the most identifiable song upon the album's release, seeing as it was highlighted on the cover after initial pressings. It’s a swinging song with light jazz drumming. The mid-tempo is augmented to grand effect by barbershop backup singers The Jordanaires, whose united sighs on the downbeats catapult the frolicsome piano line and watery guitar at a speedy gait. These aren’t simple recreations though; Cline truly leaves her stamp on the source material. Hank Williams’ country hit “Half As Much” is brought to a lazy trot to accentuate the female perspective, and “I Can’t Help It (If I’m Still in Love with You)” is sung with an on-the-lamb thirst for companionship.
Cline was a dynamo musician that jack-hammered hearts and Nashville’s stolid expectations of women artists. During her truncated career she traded in the country music garb she grew up with for fancier duds; though she was becoming a huge sensation on the outside, she remained true to her roots, even until her death. Her singing still makes other people’s attempts seem like taciturn frauds, and as for us; we’re the patsys who go along with it.
