Best by Request is a studio album by American country singer Jean Shepard. It was released in March 1970 by Capitol Records and was her fifteenth studio album. The songs were re-recordings Shepard revisited, which were considered her best known songs such as "A Satisfied Mind" and "Beautiful Lies". Best by Request made the US country albums chart following its release and received a positive review from Cash Box magazine.
Background, recording and content
Jean Shepard had been on Capitol Records since the 1950s. She topped the country music charts in 1953 with "A Dear John Letter" and would go on to have 20 years of commercial success, continually returning to a traditional country sound. By 1970, Shepard had a series of collaborative and solo singles make the top ten such as "A Satisfied Mind", "Second Fiddle (To an Old Guitar)", "I'll Take the Dog", "If Teardrops Were Silver" and "Then He Touched Me".[2] Capitol continued releasing a regular output of Shepard's material, including 1970's Best by Request. The album was recorded by producer Billy Graves three years prior, specifically in September 1967 at the Columbia Studio in Nashville, Tennessee.[3] The 12-track collection[1] consisted of re-recordings that had Shepard singing some of her most well-known material. Shepard revisited songs re-recorded from the 1950s like "A Satisfied Mind", "Beautiful Lies" and "The Other Woman".[3][4]
Release, critical reception and chart performance
Best by Request was released by Capitol Records in March 1970 and was Shepard's fifteenth studio album. Capitol distributed the disc as a vinyl LP, with six songs on each side of the record.[3] In 1972, the album was released in Australia in a vinyl LP format by the World Record Club.[5]Best by Request received a positive response from Cash Box magazine, calling it a "strong album". The magazine also believed that fans of Shepard's would enjoy the re-recordings of her most familiar songs and highlighted some of them in the review.[4]Best by Request reached number 23 on the US BillboardTop Country Albums chart. It was her highest-charting album on Billboard since the release of 1967's Your Forevers Don't Last Very Long and her last to chart until 1973's Slippin' Away.[6]
