“I Can’t Stop Loving You”
Conway Twitty
Written by Don Gibson
Billboard
#1 (1 week)
September 23, 1972
Conway Twitty is one of my favorite singers of all time, and he tackles one of the best compositions of all time with his cover of Don Gibson’s “I Can’t Stop Loving You.”
The song was Immortalized by Ray Charles, following Gibson’s original hit recording, and with both classic versions in existence, Twitty made the bold choice to experiment with the song’s signature hook.
He adds a moment of hesitation when he delivers the title, going against our expectations of a song we’re very familiar with. For me, the change is jarring to the ear, and it gets in the way of my enjoyment of the song.
But I respect his willingness to color outside the lines of a beloved classic and make it his own. It’s an approach that will serve him well down the road when Bette Midler and the Pointer Sisters have their own iconic hits that he later makes his own.
“I Can’t Stop Loving You” gets a B.
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Could this song been the “Jolene” of its time, in the sense that I remember everyone singing this somewhere on TV all the time. Conway does ok but is trying way too hard for a song that deserves more simplicity. “C+”.
This song has been recorded so much that I agree the slight melodic change is jarring to me. If I’m not listening to Gibson’s original or Ray Charles’ masterpiece, give me Johnny Rodriguez’s gorgeous rendition with a verse sung in Spanish. Not bad, but not essential Conway by any means.
Rather mediocre effort by Conway – I’d give it a “C+” (with Conway’s pipes virtually anything he chose to sing would be worth at least a “C”), but I actually like virtually every other recording of this song more that I liked this recording.
Well, If I don’t just have to play Harold Lloyd’s fool and say I love this rendition of the Don Gibson classic as much as any of the other versions mentioned.
What is he trying to do other than sound like one of the greatest stylists country music has ever known?
I have made up my mind that he succeeded!