Streakin’ through the hits with witty wordsmith Ray Stevens

Spoofing insanely ambitious French emperor Napoleon Bonaparte, presenting the cover of “He Thinks He’s Ray Stevens,” the genius singer-songwriter’s 21st album released on November 10, 1984, via MCA Nashville Records. The LP shot to No. 3 C&W, No. 118 POP on the strength of hit singles “Mississippi Squirrel Revival” and “It’s Me Again, Margaret.” Image Credit: Etsy / Universal Music Group

Singer-songwriter Ray Stevens remains a driven artist in the second decade of the 21st century. With a long and varied recording career covering novelty and political skewering that ignited 62 years ago as a member of recording impresario Bill Lowery’s Atlanta stable of artists that also numbered future stars Jerry “East Bound and Down” Reed and Joe “Games People Play” South, the experienced piano man initially tried his luck as a blue-eyed soul, combination pop purveyor.

Five lean years later Stevens finally hit paydirt in Nashville courtesy of producer Shelby Singleton, notching the Billboard Top Five novelty song “Ahab the Arab” on Mercury Records. Today he is best known for further comedy recordings like “Gitarzan,” “The Streak,” “Shriner’s Convention,” and “Mississippi Squirrel Revival.” He unequivocally mastered the novelty genre decades before “Weird Al” Yankovic unleashed “Eat It.”

But the multi-hyphenate artist isn’t so easily pigeon-holed. Witness the funky R&B pastiche of “Bridget the Midget,” the barnstormin’ accusatory found in “Mr. Businessman,” the inclusionary message of the lilting pop tune “Everything Is Beautiful,” the gospel swing of “Turn Your Radio On,” the impassioned country lament found in Kris Kristofferson’s “Sunday Mornin’ Comin’ Down,” or Stevens’s drastically revamped country pop…