Jack Greene - Statue of a Fool (CA)

All Music Guide

Country albums in the '60s sometimes seemed like singles with a lot of b-sides. Artists could release four albums a year, one for each hit single if they were lucky. Jack Greene's Statue of a Fool is like that: the title track was a number one hit, and the remaining eleven albums tracks are a mixture of covers (Gordon Lightfoot's "Ribbon of Darkness," Merle Haggard's "Hungry Eyes") and songs by Nashville songwriters like Hank Cochran and Dallas Frazier. "Bring Me Sunshine," a hit the same year for Willie Nelson, adds jazzy guitar chords and a swinging beat that show how easily the smooth-mannered Greene could have encroached on Eddy Arnold's quasi-Vegas territory. "I Don't Need Tomorrow," on the other hand, is a country shuffler with plenty of steel guitar. Greene is a capable vocalist but his something-for-everyone approach yields a forgettable product here.

- Greg Adams, All Music Guide