Norma Jean – I Guess That Comes From Being Poor

Though the cover remains mum on the subject, this single disc collects the entirety of Norma Jean’s 1972 album I Guess that Comes Being Poor and her 1968 LP Body And Mind — and tosses in all but three of the eleven tracks from 1970’s Another Man Loved Me Last Night. That’s a lot of bang for your buck! The cover misleads in another way, too, hailing Norma Jean as “the proto-Dolly Parton.” Beyond working for Porter Wagoner, though, Norma Beasler wasn’t proto-anything. In fact, with her sisterly demeanor and plaintive voice — she phrases a bit like Kitty Wells but in a huskier and vibrato-less voice — Pretty Miss Norma Jean, as Wagoner called her, would have fit comfortably within the country music scene of an earlier era. Which isn’t to say she was an anachronism. I Guess That Comes From Being Poor is a “concept” album of po’ folk songs written by the likes of Bill Anderson, Merle Haggard, and Hank Cochran — it even includes a twangier-than-Dolly version of “Coat Of Many Colors”. And Body And Mind is gender-up-to-date with cheating songs such as “In The Park After Dark” and a fine sequel to her 1967 hit “Heaven Help The Working Girl” called “Truck Driving Woman.”