Good Hearted Woman

Produced and arranged by BOB SCHERL Strings and horns arranged by JIMMIE HASKELL Front cover photoshoot by MIKE SALISBURY Album cover design by LINDA ROZELLE Executive Producer: JACK MILLMAN Re-Release project management by DANIEL EARNSHAW Re-Mastered by MIKE PIETRINI Re-Release artwork by MICHAEL INNS Photo restoration by CARL GLOVER with thanks to RAY STEVENSON Explore Rights Management © and ©1974 issued under license from Good Time Distribution Servies LLC. This edition © 2025 Explore Rights Management Ltd. Unauthorised copying, reproduction, hiring, lending and public performance strictly prohibited. info@explorerightsmanagement.com Made in the EU. Distributed in the EU by. Edel Music & Entertainment GmbH, Neumihlen 17, 22 63 Hamburg, Germany. edel.com Tonpool Medien GmbH, Im Klint 12, D 30933 Burgwede Germany. tonpool.de Suburban Records, Donkere Spaarne 14-zw, 24J 1J Haarlem, The Netherlands, suburban.nl Audioglobe S..L, Via Volga 47 50019, Osmannoro FI, Italy. audioglobe it Socadisc, rue Pasteur, BP 30035, 91790 Boissy under Saint Yon, France. socadisc.com Liner Notes by EDDY ARMANI: When Tina Turner began work on her first solo album in 1974 she was riding high from writing the hit record Nutbush City Limits. Ike and Tina had also enjoyed a hit with Proud Mary and a tour with the Rolling Stones had opened a lot of doors to new audiences. Ike and Tina performed on a lot of TV variety shows and their live set always included covers of popular songs of the day. My role was to answer Tina's fan mail and run her fan club before I went on to become her PA. I had a table set up in the corner and watched the album being recorded. An investor called Jack Millman had come on the scene with a lot of ideas and one of them was to record a country album to launch Tina as a solo artist. This was a new direction for Tina and the song selection was entirely based on what could be performed on variety shows. One of them was a song that Waylon Jennings and Willie Nelson co-wrote called "Good Hearted Woman" after being inspired by a quote in an advertisement about Tina. The album was recorded in a matter of weeks in between other bookings at Bolic Sound Studio. Jack financed everything including strings and horns being added to help give the songs a full-bodied sound. After each backing track was complete Tina would rehearse, with the producer Bob Scherl, before going into the vocal booth where she recorded the lead vocal parts in one or sometimes two takes. There weren't any time pressures but her vocal sessions were often done swiftly earning her the nickname One Take Tina. I saw some of the musicians speculating what country music fans over in Nashville would think of Tina, an artist known for R&B, recording a country album. Tina's reaction was "I'm a Tennessee Girl!" and she was excited about recording a country album. At the time country music was to white people what the blues was to black people...it was their music. It made Tina want to do it even more to show that a girl from Nutbush, Tennessee could cross the tracks to sing those songs from Nashville, Tennessee. There were a lot of doors open for Tina and there was a confident belief the music could break down any barriers. It motivated Tina to express herself and she had a voice that could cross from R&B to country music and later to pop and rock. The country girl in Tina Turner had always been there and it was part of her success for all of her life. Tina chose the front cover image which was a fun photo of her upside down in jeans. It was originally shot for an article about clothing in an issue of Rolling Stone magazine but she loved it and wanted it for her album cover. Jack Millman had invested a lot of money and everyone involved had spent a lot of time to present prospective record companies with the final Good Hearted Woman masters. The finished album was sent out to record executives and everyone waited to hear what response it would receive. United Artists came back really interested in signing Tina as a solo artist but... they rejected the album completely. It was a surprise to everyone involved. To be willing to sign Tina, they wanted her first solo album to have country songs that had been selected by their A&R staff. They also wanted a slower mellow tempo and to hire a different producer. This presented a potential conflict with Jack Millman who had financed and organized everything during the recording process. It was agreed the honorable thing to do was to make an agreement with Jack and it ended up that he'd own the Good Hearted Woman album rights and Tina was free to then launch a solo career with United Artists. The sessions to record ten more country songs began shortly after that and United Artist's A&R staff also replaced the album cover image with their own idea of Tina sitting with a drape over her shoulder. Tina On! Proud of the resultant "Tina Turns The Country and it went on to be nominated for a Grammy. Tina's career went from strength to strength as her solo albums moved from country to pop and rock with Acid Queen, Rough and then Love Explosion. Her name as a solo artist was growing... In 1979 Jack Millman took the Good Hearted Woman tapes off the shelf and released them on his own Wagner Records label. A single was also released of "If This Is The Last Time" (b/w "We Had It All"). When compact dise became the most popular music format Good Hearted Woman was rereleased dozens of times, under many different names along the lines of 'Tina Sings Country' but often in very poor sound quality. Tina knew it was available but never really commented on it. Tina Turns The Country On! was unavailable for many decades until a 50th Anniversary edition was released in 2024 taken from the original master tapes. I'm so pleased this edition of Good Hearted Woman also uses a transfer of the master tapes. The world can now hear both visions for Tina Turner's first solo album... EDDY ARMANI June 2025