“How Can I Unlove You”
Lynn Anderson
Written by Joe South
Billboard
#1 (3 weeks)
October 16 – October 30, 1971
There are so many things that I adore about this record.
The vocal performance, most especially. Anderson soars on the verses then goes into a Supremes-styled chorus, seamlessly interweaving two distinctive musical styles into one cohesive performance.
And the strings are off the hook, y’all. Off. The. Hook. This rivals “Rose Garden” in earworm status. I’ve been bouncing along to it all week.
But this is also a heartbreak anthem, so it makes for an odd contrast. I like to think we’re being washed away in the love she feels that overwhelms her better judgment. But that’s a lot of heavy lifting on my part to make it work.
I also just hate the “un-” everything that isn’t supposed to have an “un-” in front of it. That ruined “Unbreak My Heart” for me, too. Un this, un that, un not for me.
So a few flaws keep this one from perfection, but I still recommend it wholeheartedly.
“How Can I Unlove You” gets an B+.
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A “B-“. It’s catchy for sure and I don’t mind the “un” but It’s easy to see why it didn’t have the staying power of Rose Garden. When I was young I never understood why she wasn’t as highly regarded as Loretta, Tammy, & Dolly from the same era. But looking back it’s pretty simple. It really is about the SONG. Her material, other than Rose Garden, just wasn’t great. I actually remember her saying in an interview once that she was losing material to Tammy that was written by her husband. I have never researched so don’t know if it’s actually true or not.
Lynn Anderson had an extended stay at the top (her five-year peak period was as dominant as any female ever had) and was an interesting, if overly frenetic, live performer. Her recordings were the epitome of the “Country Cocktail” style of Glenn Sutton & Billy Sherrill, even more so than their work with George Jones, David Houston and Tammy Wynette. From 1970-1974 Lynn had five Billboard #1s (plus three more that went to #1 on either Record World and/or Cash Box). Record World named her Female Country Artist of the Decade for the 1970s. Always a bit of an outsider, she did not receive much recognition from the CMA (other than for “Rose Garden” which was such a big hit that they could not ignore it completely).
The album from which the song was taken was a very successful album although only the title track was released as a single. This album includes covers of such songs as John Denver’s “Take Me Home, Country Roads”, Freddie Hart’s “Easy Loving”, Jerry Lee Lewis’s “What Made Milwaukee Famous” , and Carole King’s “You’ve Got A Friend” (a hit for James Taylor). I would give the album a B+ and the single an A
She was a truly great recording artist and it is criminal that she has yet to be inducted into the Country Music Hall of Fame.
I won’t always have something to say about these 70s hits not because I don’t enjoy them but because I don’t have enough background with them to have a fully formed opinion. My initiation with Lynn Anderson’s hit catalogue outside of “Rose Garden” is gonna be one of the most satisfying exercises from this feature as I really love her sound. I’ll concur that this one offers more sonic rewards than lyrical ones, but it’s usually an enriching experience to have even one of the two as it is here.