Cheating song a hit for Don Gibson
This week in 1972: EPA Director Ruckelshaus banned the use of DDT; 75,000 people attended a Billy Graham Texas rally billed as “religious Woodstock”; Howard Hughes biographer Irving got 2.5 years for fraud—his wife Edith is fined $10,000; and a Shelby, N.C. singer had his 44th hit record.
A lot of hit songs have to do with cheating and Don Gibson’s 1972 No 1 “Woman, Sensuous Woman” was one of those tunes.
The song was written by Gary Paxton and was the story of a guy who cheats on his wife with another woman who just puts him under a spell and keeps him there.
The single was Gibson’s third No 1 as a recording artist and also his first and final No 1 for Hickory Records, after scoring hits on RCA Victor from 1956 until 1969.
The single was produced by Wesley Rose.
Donald Eugene Gibson was born in Shelby, N.C. in 1928 into a poor working class family. He dropped out of school in the second grade, became interested in music and recorded his first single in 1948. In 1957 he was signed to record for RCA Victor Records and worked with Chet Atkins who produced his double-sided hit “Oh Lonesome me” and “I Can’t Stop Loving You.”
He charted 35 songs on RCA Victor then switched to Hickory Records where he charted 27 more singles— duets with Sue Thompson. He also scored four hits on RCA Victor with Dottie West.
Gibson joined the Grand Ole Opry in 1958 and was inducted into The Country Music Hall Of Fame in 2001. Don Gibson died in 2003 at age 75.
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