4 Songs That Display the Brilliance of Pop Music Legend Gene Pitney

Modern music fans might not know too much about the work of Gene Pitney, who passed away in 2006. He was a standout songwriter and a thrilling performer, both of his own songs and of those written by others.

He managed to churn out hits throughout the 60s, even when the rock-band era arrived and overwhelmed many solo performers like him. Here are four of Pitney’s most memorable songs.

“Town Without Pity”

Pitney was still in the early stages of his recording career when he laid down this track in 1961. He started to find his way singing songs for movies, a surefire way to get attention in that era. Unfortunately for Pitney, the movie Town Without Pity didn’t exactly light up the box office. Maybe that’s why the corresponding song barely squeaked into the Top 40. But the audio evidence shows that Pitney already possessed a knack for teasing every last bit of drama out of a set of lyrics. There are times on “Town Without Pity” when he swaggers across a lyrical line like Bobby Darin might. But then he contrasts that with desperate emotional pleas as if he were Johnny Ray. A bravura performance that is now recognized as one of his best.

“(The Man Who Shot) Liberty Valance”

Like so many of the top pop artists of the decade, Pitney took several stops on Burt Bacharach Way and Hal David Boulevard. The songwriting team delivered several songs that Pitney recorded with success. But “(The Man Who Shot) Liberty Valance” might have been the most important of those, as it helped establish Pitney as a major star in the US. The song made it to No. 4 in 1962, giving Pitney his first Top 10 in America. It served as the title song to the movie of the same name, a Western starring John Wayne and Jimmy Stewart. Over a typically ambitious Bacharach production, Pitney turns the expository lyrics into a passionate defense of the protagonist’s behavior.

“It Hurts To Be In Love”

Many of the pop vocalists who had established a beachhead on the charts in the early 60s were washed away by the arrival of The Beatles and the rest of the British Invasion. But Pitney held strong, at least in the first years of the rock boom, by showing he could go uptempo occasionally. In this case, he kind of stumbled into a readymade hit. Neil Sedaka wanted to record “It Hurts To Be In Love”, which was written by Howard Greenfield and Helen Miller. But after cutting the track, a contractual snafu kept Sedaka from releasing it. Pitney, whose voice bore some similarity to Sedaka’s, stepped in and sang a new lead vocal over the existing track. It worked like a charm, landing him a No. 6 hit in 1964.

“I’m Gonna Be Strong”

If you were a solo singer in the 60s and wanted to hang with the titans of the era, you needed a firm hold on how to handle a ballad. “I’m Gonna Be Strong” was written by Barry Mann and Cynthia Weil, a duo responsible for many of the most iconic slow songs of the era. The writers understood the importance of a slow build in songs like that. It was incumbent upon the singer to also nail that vibe. Listen to how Pitney tackles “I’m Gonna Be Strong”, which has more than a little in common with a Roy Orbison weeper. In the opening lines, he sings softly enough that you can believe he’s holding it together. When he belts out the final line, you know that the brave façade has been shattered.

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