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About Ricky Nelson

Rick Nelson was one of the very biggest of the ’50s teen idols, so

it took awhile for him to attain the same level of critical respectability

as other early rock greats. Yet now the consensus is that he made

some of the finest pop/rock recordings of his era. Sure, he had more

promotional push than any other rock musician of the ’50s; no, he

wasn’t the greatest singer; and yes, Elvis, Gene Vincent, Carl

Perkins, and others rocked harder. But Nelson was extraordinarily

consistent during the first five years of his recording career, crafting

pleasant pop-rockabilly hybrids with ace session players and

projecting an archetype of the sensitive, reticent young adult

with his accomplished vocals. He also played a somewhat

underestimated role in rock & roll’s absorption into mainstream

America — how bad could rock be if it was featured on one of

America’s favorite family situation comedies on a weekly basis?

Nelson entered professional entertainment before his tenth

birthday, when he appeared with father Ozzie (once a jazz

musician), mother Harriet, and brother David on a radio

comedy series based around the family. By the early ’50s,

the series was on television, and Ricky grew into a teenager in

public. He was just the right age to have his life turned around

by rock & roll in 1956 and started his recording career almost

accidentally the following year. The story’s sometimes been told

that he had no professional singing ambitions until he recorded

his debut single to impress a girlfriend. The single, a cover of

Fats Domino’s “I’m Walkin’” that went to number four, was

helped immensely (as all of his early singles would be) by

plugs on the Ozzie & Harriet TV show.

So far the script was adhering to the Pat Boone teen idol

prototype — a whitewash of an R&B hit stealing the thunder

from the pop audience, sung by a young, good-looking fella

with barely any musical experience to speak of. What happened

next was easy to predict commercially but surprisingly satisfying

musically as well. Nelson was a fairly hip kid who preferred the

rockabilly of Carl Perkins and Elvis Presley to the fodder dished

out for teen idols, and over the next five years he would offer his

own brand of rockabilly music, albeit one with some smooth

Hollywood production touches and occasional pure pop ballads.

Nelson recruited one of the greatest early rock guitarists, James

Burton, to supply authentic licks (another great guitarist, Joe

Maphis, played on some early sides). Some of his best and

toughest songs (”Believe What You Say,” “It’s Late”) were written

by Johnny and/or Dorsey Burnette, who had previously been in one

of the best rockabilly combos, the Johnny Burnette Rock ‘n Roll Trio.

Ricky could rock pretty hard when he wanted to, as on “Be-Bop

Baby” and “Stood Up,” though in a polished fashion that wasn’t

quite as wild and threatening as rockabilly’s Southern originators.

Nelson really hit his stride, though, with mid-tempo numbers and

ballads that provided a more secure niche for his calm vocals and

narrow range. From 1957 to 1962, he was about the highest-selling

singer in the U.S. except for Elvis, making the Top 40 about 30

times. “Poor Little Fool” and “Lonesome Town” (1958) were early

indications of his ballad style; in the early ’60s, “Travelin’ Man,”

“Young World,” “Teen Age Idol,” and other hits pointed to a more

countrified, mature style as he honed in on his 21st birthday

(by which time he would shorten his billing from “Ricky” to “Rick”).

He could still play rockabilly from time to time, the most

memorable example being “Hello, Mary Lou” (co-written by Gene

Pitney), with its electrifying James Burton solos.

Nelson was lured away from the Imperial label by a mammoth

20-year contract with Decca in 1963 (which would be terminated

prematurely in the mid-’70s), and for a year or so the hits continued,

at a less frenetic pace. Early-1964’s “For You,” however, would be

his last big smash of the ’60s. The fault wasn’t all the Beatles and

changing music trends — on both singles and albums, much of the

material was either substandard pop or dusty Tin Pan Alley

standards, although isolated tracks still generated some sparks.

He wasn’t exactly starving, as he continued to appear on Ozzie and

Harriet. But by the mid-’60s even that institution was declining in

popularity, leading to its cancellation in 1966.

Nelson had a strong country feel to much of his material from the

beginning, and by the late ’60s it was becoming dominant. He

covered straight country material by the likes of Willie Nelson

and Doug Kershaw and formed one of the earliest country-rock

groups, the Stone Canyon Band, with musicians who had played

(or would play) with Poco, Buck Owens, Little Feat, and Roger

McGuinn. A cover of Bob Dylan’s “She Belongs to Me” made the

Top 40 in 1970, but his country-rock outings attracted more

critical acclaim than commercial success, until 1972’s “Garden

Party.” A rare self-composed number, based around the frosty

reception granted his contemporary material at a rock & roll oldies

show, it became his last Top Ten hit.

Nelson would continue to record off and on for the next dozen

years and toured constantly, yet he was unable to capitalize on his

assets. A big part of the problem was that although Nelson wanted

to play contemporary music, he didn’t write much of his own

material, which was a basic precept of self-respecting rock acts

after the advent of the Beatles. Nor did he tap into good outside

compositions, and there’s little of interest on the albums he

recorded over the last decade or so of his life. He died (along with

his fiancée) in a private plane crash on December 31, 1985, on his

way to a New Year’s Eve gig in Dallas, at the age of 45.

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