''Clean Cut'' is the fourteenth solo studio album by American

country music Country (also called country and western) is a genre of popular music that originated in the Southern and Southwestern United States in the early 1920s. It primarily derives from blues, church music such as Southern gospel and spirituals, o ...

artist

Barbara Mandrell Barbara Ann Mandrell (born December 25, 1948) is an American country music singer and musician. She is also credited as an actress and author. During the late 1970s and early 1980s, she was considered among country's most successful music artist ...

. The album was released in March 1984 on

MCA Records MCA Records was an American record label owned by MCA Inc., which later became part of Universal Music Group. Pre-history MCA Inc., a powerful talent agency and a television production company, entered the recorded music business in 1962 wi ...

and was produced by

Tom Collins The Tom Collins is a Collins cocktail made from gin, lemon juice, sugar, and carbonated water. First memorialized in writing in 1876 by Jerry Thomas, "the father of American mixology", this "gin and sparkling lemonade" drink is typically serv ...

. It was one of two studio albums Mandrell released in 1984.

Background and content

''Clean Cut'' was recorded in January 1984 at the Woodland Sound Studio in

Nashville, Tennessee Nashville is the capital city of the U.S. state of Tennessee and the seat of Davidson County. With a population of 689,447 at the 2020 U.S. census, Nashville is the most populous city in the state, 21st most-populous city in the U.S., and t ...

United States The United States of America (U.S.A. or USA), commonly known as the United States (U.S. or US) or America, is a country primarily located in North America. It consists of 50 U.S. state, states, a Washington, D.C., federal district, five ma ...

. Like Mandrell's previous releases, the album contained 10 tracks. Most of the song's themes were built around the traditional working class country music perspective but had a

country pop Country pop (also known as pop country or urban cowboy) is a fusion genre of country music and pop music that was developed by members of the country genre out of a desire to reach a larger, mainstream audience. Country pop music blends genres ...

arrangement. Songs such as "Only a Lonely Heart Knows", "Happy Birthday Dear Heartache", and "I Can Depend on You" had a significant pop-sounding arrangement. Like most of Barbara's MCA output, ''Clean Cut'' was only ever issued on a

long-playing record The LP (from "long playing" or "long play") is an analog sound storage medium, a phonograph record format characterized by: a speed of rpm; a 12- or 10-inch (30- or 25-cm) diameter; use of the "microgroove" groove specification; and a ...

, with five songs per side.

Release

Unlike her previous releases, ''Clean Cut'' spawned three singles in 1984. "Happy Birthday Dear Heartache" was the first single from the album released in January 1984. The song peaked at No. 3 on the ''

Billboard Magazine ''Billboard'' (stylized as ''billboard'') is an American music and entertainment magazine published weekly by Penske Media Corporation. The magazine provides music charts, news, video, opinion, reviews, events, and style related to the music ...

'' Country Singles Chart and No. 18 on the Canadian ''

RPM Revolutions per minute (abbreviated rpm, RPM, rev/min, r/min, or with the notation min−1) is a unit of rotational speed or rotational frequency for rotating machines. Standards ISO 80000-3:2019 defines a unit of rotation as the dimension ...

'' Country Tracks chart. The second single, "Only a Lonely Heart Knows" was issued in May 1984 and reached No. 2 on the ''Billboard'' Country Singles Chart and became her final number one hit on the Canadian Country chart. "Crossword Puzzle" was the third and final single released from the album, reaching No. 11 on the ''Billboard'' Country chart, becoming her first single since 1981 to miss the Top 10 on the chart. ''Clean Cut'' was also released in 1984 and peaked at No. 8 on the ''Billboard Magazine''

Top Country Albums Top Country Albums is a chart published weekly by '' Billboard'' magazine in the United States. The 50-position chart lists the most popular country music albums in the country, calculated weekly by Broadcast Data Systems based on physical sales ...

chart and peaked outside the ''Billboard'' 200 albums chart, reaching No. 204.

Track listing

Side one #"

Happy Birthday Dear Heartache "Happy Birthday Dear Heartache" is a song written by Archie Jordan and Mack David, and recorded by American country music artist Barbara Mandrell. It was released in January 1984 as the first single from the album '' Clean Cut''. The song reached ...

" (

Mack David Mack David (July 5, 1912 – December 30, 1993) was an American lyricist and songwriter, best known for his work in film and television, with a career spanning the period between the early 1940s and the early 1970s. David was credited with writing ...

, Archie Jordan) – 2:34 #"If It's Not One Thing, It's Another" (Steve Dean,

Frank J. Myers Frank Joseph Myers (born July 3, 1957) is an American country music singer, songwriter, and record producer. He has received multiple awards including a Grammy for " Best Country Song" which he and frequent songwriting partner Gary Baker (form ...

) – 3:48 #"I Can Depend on You" (

Dennis Morgan Dennis Morgan (born Earl Stanley Morner, December 20, 1908 – September 7, 1994) was an American actor-singer. He used the acting pseudonym Richard Stanley before adopting the name under which he gained his greatest fame. According to one ob ...

Stephen Allen Davis Stephen Allen Davis (October 4, 1949 – December 26, 2022) was an American singer-songwriter. Many of his songs are credited as "Steve Davis". He has written 18 number one songs for various artists, including the single "Stand Beside Me" for co ...

) – 3:54 #"I Wonder What the Rich Folk Are Doin' Tonight" (W. T. Davidson, Myers, Dean) – 2:49 #"

Crossword Puzzle A crossword is a word puzzle that usually takes the form of a square or a rectangular grid of white- and black-shaded squares. The goal is to fill the white squares with letters, forming words or phrases, by solving clues which lead to the a ...

" (Dean, Myers) – 3:37 Side two #" Only a Lonely Heart Knows" (Morgan, Davis) – 3:48 #"Just Like Old Times" (Rafe Van Hoy,

Deborah Allen Deborah Allen (born Deborah Lynn Thurmond on September 30, 1953) is an American country music singer and songwriter. Since 1976, Allen has issued 12 albums and charted 14 singles on the ''Billboard'' Hot Country Songs chart. She recorded the 1 ...

) – 2:58 #"Look What Love Has Done" (Morgan, Davis) – 3:21 #"Take Care of You" (Morgan, Davis) – 3:00 #"Sincerely, I'm Yours" (David, Jordan) – 2:48

Personnel

Acoustic Guitar An acoustic guitar is a musical instrument in the string family. When a string is plucked its vibration is transmitted from the bridge, resonating throughout the top of the guitar. It is also transmitted to the side and back of the instrument, ...

: Pete Bordonali, Jimmy Capps, Dennis Morgan, Frank J. Myers *

Banjo The banjo is a stringed instrument with a thin membrane stretched over a frame or cavity to form a resonator. The membrane is typically circular, and usually made of plastic, or occasionally animal skin. Early forms of the instrument were fashi ...

: Fred Newell *

Bass guitar The bass guitar, electric bass or simply bass (), is the lowest-pitched member of the string family. It is a plucked string instrument similar in appearance and construction to an electric or an acoustic guitar, but with a longer neck and s ...

David Hungate William David Hungate (born August 5, 1948) is an American bass guitarist noted as a member of the Los Angeles pop-rock band Toto from 1976 to 1982 and again from 2014 to 2015, and the son of judge William L. Hungate. Along with most of his T ...

Joe Osborn Joseph Osborn (August 28, 1937 – December 14, 2018Drums A drum kit (also called a drum set, trap set, or simply drums) is a collection of drums, cymbals, and other auxiliary percussion instruments set up to be played by one person. The player (drummer) typically holds a pair of matching drumsticks ...

Eddie Bayers Eddie Bayers (born January 28, 1949) is an American session drummer who has played on 300 gold and platinum albums. He received the Academy of Country Music 'Drummer of the Year Award' for fourteen years, has three times won the Nashville Music ...

James Stroud James Stroud is an American musician and record producer who works in pop, rock, R&B, soul, disco, and country music. He played with the Malaco Rhythm Section for Malaco Records. In the 1990s, he was the president of Giant Records (a subsidi ...

Electric Guitar An electric guitar is a guitar that requires external amplification in order to be heard at typical performance volumes, unlike a standard acoustic guitar (however combinations of the two - a semi-acoustic guitar and an electric acoustic gu ...

: Pete Bordonali,

Larry Byrom Steppenwolf was an American-Canadian rock band that was prominent from 1968 to 1972. The group was formed in late 1967 in Los Angeles by lead singer John Kay, keyboardist Goldy McJohn, and drummer Jerry Edmonton, all formerly of the Canadian ...

, Jon Goin * Fiddle:

Hoot Hester Hubert Dwane "Hoot" Hester (August 13, 1951 – August 30, 2016) was an American fiddle player, multi-instrumentalist, and country music and bluegrass artist. He was born on a small farm near Louisville, Kentucky, on August 13, 1951. Hester played ...

Harmonica The harmonica, also known as a French harp or mouth organ, is a free reed wind instrument used worldwide in many musical genres, notably in blues, American folk music, classical music, jazz, country, and rock. The many types of harmonica in ...

Terry McMillan Terry McMillan (born October 18, 1951) is an American novelist. Her work centers around the experiences of Black women in the United States. Early life McMillan was born in Port Huron, Michigan. She received a B.A. in journalism in 1977 from ...

Piano The piano is a stringed keyboard instrument in which the strings are struck by wooden hammers that are coated with a softer material (modern hammers are covered with dense wool felt; some early pianos used leather). It is played using a musica ...

: David Briggs, Bobby Ogdin *

Rhodes Piano The Rhodes piano (also known as the Fender Rhodes piano) is an electric piano invented by Harold Rhodes, which became popular in the 1970s. Like a conventional piano, the Rhodes generates sound with keys and hammers, but instead of strings, th ...

: David Briggs, Bobby Ogdin * Slide Guitar: Larry Byrom *

Steel Guitar A steel guitar ( haw, kīkākila) is any guitar played while moving a steel bar or similar hard object against plucked strings. The bar itself is called a "steel" and is the source of the name "steel guitar". The instrument differs from a conve ...

: Sonny Garrish * Strings:

The Nashville String Machine Nashville String Machine is a musical collective comprising session musicians, based in Nashville, Tennessee, United States. Members of the group have been credited on records dating from 1972 to the present, although the group was formally formed ...

*String Arranger: Archie Jordan, D. Bergen White *

Synthesizer A synthesizer (also spelled synthesiser) is an electronic musical instrument that generates audio signals. Synthesizers typically create sounds by generating waveforms through methods including subtractive synthesis, additive synthesis ...

: Bobby Ogdin, Alan Steinberger *

Tambourine The tambourine is a musical instrument in the percussion family consisting of a frame, often of wood or plastic, with pairs of small metal jingles, called " zills". Classically the term tambourine denotes an instrument with a drumhead, thou ...

: Tim Farmer, James Stroud

Charts

Weekly charts

Year-end charts

Singles

References

{{Authority control 1984 albums Barbara Mandrell albums MCA Records albums Albums produced by Tom Collins (record producer)