Released 1965 Genre Country Label Musicor 1098 | Format 7" single Length 2:00 | |
B-side "I Can't Get Used to Being Lonely" | ||
"Love Bug", also spelled "Lovebug," is a single by American country music artist George Jones. Jones' version, which also features a young Johnny Paycheck on backup vocals and draws heavily from the Bakersfield sound as popularized by Buck Owens, reached #6 on the Billboard Hot Country Singles chart in 1965.
Contents
Background
By 1965, one of the few other country singers who was as hot as Jones on the country charts was Buck Owens, who had helped establish Bakersfield as an alternative to Nashville as a country music center. The Bakersfield sound was seen as having more bite than the more tepid Nashville sound, and a rivalry soon sprouted; in the 2001 documentary series Lost Highway music journalist Chet Flippo states, "I think that Nashville felt that Bakersfield was a bad smell that they wished would go away. It really had nothing to do with the scene in Nashville but country radio loved that music, so there was a certain co-existence that had to go on." This rivalry extended to Jones and Owens; although they would always remain friends, during the occasions in which they toured together in the early days they often argued about who would close the show, with Jones recalling in his autobiography I Lived to Tell It All that he "was resentful because Buck's home in Bakersfield did not make him part of the Nashville family."
Recording and composition
"Love Bug" was written by Wayne Kemp and Curtis Wayne. Lyrically, the song celebrates the giddiness of new love that's "got the whole world shook up." Musically, the song is an unmistakable nod to the Bakersfield sound, from the treble on the guitars to George's elongated delivery at the start, "Oh...that...little bitty teeny weeny thing they call the love bug," which is reminiscent of Owens hits like "Love's Gonna Live Here" and "I've Got a Tiger By the Tail". Several alternate takes of the song can be heard on the Jones box set Walk Through This World with Me: The Complete Musicor Recordings 1965-1971, including a version with an overdriven electric guitar solo and harmonica that makes it sound more like a Rolling Stones record of the time than either Nashville or Bakersfield. Jones later recorded the song as a duet with Vince Gill on the 1994 album The Bradley Barn Sessions.
George Strait version
George Strait released a cover of the song in February 1994 as the third single from his album Easy Come, Easy Go. Strait's version reached #8 on the Billboard Hot Country Singles & Tracks chart in May 1994.
George Strait version
"Love Bug" re-entered the U.S. Billboard Hot Country Singles & Tracks chart at number 74 as an official single for the week of March 5, 1994.