Gene Pitney – Big Sixteen LP Stereo Rarities from Vinyl – Take Me Tonight, Tower Tall, Half Heaven Half Heartache, True Love Never Runs Smooth

Gene Pitney’s Big Sixteen (Musicor MS3008) in STEREO is American singer Gene Pitney‘s seventh album, released on the Musicor label in 1964. The album contains a mix of hit singles and album cuts compiled from Pitney’s early records.  If you’re looking for a representative sample of Pitney’s best, this would be a good one.  Even the non-hits are excellent and could have been hits themselves. The LP features five Bacharach- David songs and one self-penned (Mecca) and several standouts by long-time producer-writer extraordinaire, Aaron Schroeder. among others.

Of course, Gene Pitney was an under-rated singer who had  many hits in the 1960s. He  could have fared better but his style couldn’t be pigeon-holed. He wasn’t pure rock and roll, nor pure country, nor  rhythm and blues but a little of all. He was influenced early by the soulful Clyde McPhatter and later would cut several country LPs with country great George Jones and Melba Montgomery. But mostly, he had a unique style of his own, which can be heard here.

We have chosen to feature five non-hits and one hit, ‘Half Heaven Half Heartache’ which did reach no. 12 in 1962, and for us is one of his top two best. Note the superior ‘warm, rich’ sound quality as these cuts are taken directly from the original LP versions.  ‘Take Me Tonight’ is another standout from Schroeder and others that, we believe, is based on a classical tune, perhaps by Chopin.  Our PICK HIT is Keep Telling Yourself, which we’ve made into a video .  True Love Never Runs Smooth is from Bacharach-David   Enjoy!

PICK TO CLICK – ‘KEEP TELLING YOURSELF’

Take Me Tonight.wav

Half Heaven – Half Heartache- Pitney.wav 

Tower Tall- partial.wav

Mecca – partial.wav  (written by Gene Pitney)

True Love Never Runs Smooth – Pitney parital.wav

For your own complete tracks, The LP vinyl editions,  previously owner, can still be hunted down via amazon, ebay and elsewhere- It’s worth the effort.

This stereo version of the LP is currently  available (as of this writing)  for a bargain price of $7.98 (price guides list it at $40 or more ) > https://amzn.to/3KdMUeV

Track listing 

Side 1 

1. “Ship True Love Goodbye” (Mark Barkan, Neval Nader) – 2:25 (from Gene Pitney Sings Just for You)
2. “Twenty Four Hours From Tulsa” (Hal David, Burt Bacharach) – 3:00 (from Blue Gene)
3. “Only Love Can Break a Heart” (David, Bacharach) – 2:49 (from Only Love Can Break a Heart)
4. “Not Responsible” (Ben Raleigh, Barkan) – 2:31 (from Gene Pitney Sings Just for You)
5. “Teardrop by Teardrop” (Bob Halley) – 2:19 (from Gene Pitney Sings Just for You)
6. “Donna Means Heartbreak” (David, Paul Hampton) – 2:23 (from Only Love Can Break a Heart)
7. “Aladdin’s Lamp” (Gene Pitney) – 2:28 (from Gene Pitney Sings Just for You)
8. “The Man Who Shot Liberty Valance” (David, Bacharach) – 2:58 (from Only Love Can Break a Heart)

Side 2 

1. “Keep Tellin’ Yourself” (Ellie Greenwich, Elmo Glick, Tony Powers) – 2:23 (from Blue Gene)
2. “Mecca” (John Gluck Jr., Nader) – 2:21 (from Gene Pitney Sings Just for You)
3. “Town Without Pity” (Dimitri Tiomkin, Ned Washington) – 2:55 (from The Many Sides of Gene Pitney)
4. “Tower Tall” (Mel Mandel, Norman Sachs) – 3:21 (from Only Love Can Break a Heart)
5. “Cry Your Eyes Out” (Raleigh, J. Gluck) – 2:04 (from Only Love Can Break a Heart)
6. “True Love Never Runs Smooth” (David, Bacharach) – 2:26 (from Only Love Can Break a Heart)
7. “Take Me Tonight” (Aaron Schroeder, Roy Alfred, Wally Gold) – 2:37 (from The Many Sides of Gene Pitney)
8. “Half Heaven – Half Heartache” (Schroeder, George Goehring, Gold)– 2:43 (from Only Love Can Break a Heart)