Country Heart

Country Heart is an album by American country music artist George Jones. It was released in 1966 as a double LP on the Musicor Records label, and was available exclusively through the Columbia Record Club.

Background

Although Country Heart contained several hits Jones had scored with Musicor, it is not actually a greatest hits collection. It includes a rerecording of Jones's first number one country hit "White Lightnin'" as well as a remake of his hit duet "We Must Have Been Out Of Our Minds" with Melba Montgomery from 1963. Curiously, the album also features an instrumental version of the "The Race Is On", which had gone to number three for Jones in 1964 when he was still with United Artists. Country Heart also showcases the songwriting talents of Jones friend Earl "Peanut" Montgomery, whom the country star had begun to rely on more heavily for new material. "From Here To The Door" was written by Don Chapel, who was married to Tammy Wynette at the time.

"Walk Through This World with Me" would become a number one hit for Jones in 1967, his first chart topper in five years. According to Bob Allen's book George Jones: The Life and Times of a Honky Tonk Legend, Jones was less than enthusiastic about the "musically middle-of-the-road love ballad that was almost inspirational in its unabashedly optimistic and romantic sentiments - a far cry from 'The Window Up Above,'" and it was only at his producer H.W. "Pappy" Daily's insistence that he recorded the song at all. "Four-O-Thirty Three" and "Things Have Gone To Pieces" had also been top ten hits for Jones.