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It Wasn't God Who Made Honky Tonk Angels

"It Wasn't God Who Made Honky Tonk Angels"
Kittyhonkytonk.jpg
Single by Kitty Wells
Released June 1952 (U.S.)
Format 7", 78 rpm
Recorded May 3, 1952
Castle Studios,
Nashville, Tennessee
Genre Country
Length 2:38
Label Decca 28232
Writer(s) J. D. "Jay" Miller
Producer(s) Paul Cohen
Kitty Wells singles chronology
"Glory Land March"
(1952)
"It Wasn't God Who Made Honky Tonk Angels"
(1952)
"Paying For That Back Street Affair"
(1953)

"It Wasn't God Who Made Honky Tonk Angels" is a 1952 country song written by J. D. "Jay" Miller, and originally recorded by Kitty Wells. It was an answer song to the Hank Thompson hit "The Wild Side of Life."

The song — which blamed unfaithful men for creating unfaithful women — became the first No. 1 Billboard country hit for a solo female artist. In addition to helping establish Wells as country music's first major female star, "It Wasn't God..." paved the way for other female artists, particularly Dolly Parton, Patsy Cline, Loretta Lynn, and Tammy Wynette, and songs where women defied the typical stereotype of being submissive to men and putting up with their often unfaithful ways.

In the late 1940s, Wells had recorded on RCA Victor, but had little success there. By 1952, she was recording on Decca Records, and recorded "It Wasn't God Who Made Honky Tonk Angels" at her first recording session.

In "The Wild Side of Life," Thompson expresses regret his bride-to-be has left him for another man whom she met in a roadhouse, stating, "I didn't know that God made honky tonk angels." That song and its appeal to people who "thought the world was going to hell and that faithless women deserved a good deal of the blame...just begged for an answer from a woman".

The rebuttal song, as it turned out, was written by Jay Miller, although it was Wells who made it a hit. In "It Wasn't God..." – which follows the same melody, but more uptempo – she cites the original song and counters that, for every woman who had been led astray, it was a man who led her there (often through his own infidelity). She also expresses frustration about how women are always made scapegoats for the man's faults in a given relationship.

Wells' statement was a rather daring one to make in 1952, particularly in the conservative, male-dominated realm of country music; women's liberation and their sentiments in song were still more than 10 years away. There was plenty of resistance to the song and its statement: the NBC radio network banned the song for being "suggestive," while Wells was prohibited from performing it on the Grand Ole Opry and NBC's "Prince Albert" radio program.


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