1 March 1973
‘I Know You’re Married But I Love You Still’ was co-written by Dolly Parton, and among its recordings is a duet by her with her long-time double-act partner Porter Wagoner. The shortened title of Big Tom’s version seems like an effort to ensure provincial ’70s Ireland didn’t think this was a song about an extramarital affair. (It isn’t.)
As we saw with Whitney Houston’s power-hosing of ‘I Will Always Love You’, comparing any cover of a Dolly song to its original is a fool’s errand. Still, in fairness to Big Tom his version has some slight merits. The distinctive combination of depth and tremble in his voice means he does a passingly alright approximation of mashing Wagoner’s rich timbre with Dolly’s twinkling sincerity; the effect is a rare country & Irish record in which a male singer conveys credible emotional depth rather than sounding like he’s entertaining his nan. Musically, Tom’s signature sound, on this record and elsewhere, of strong electric guitar picking and bar-room piano suggests he had a better ear and feel for classic Nashville’s rhinestone shimmer and whiskey burn than most other country & Irish acts did. Big Tom’s innate dreariness is still an obstacle to liking his records and his style, but on ‘I Love You Still’ for once we can just about, on tippytoes, see over it.
