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Every Billboard Hot 100 Single 1970: #198: “Cinnamon Girl”- The Gentrys. April 18, 1970.
- Single: “Cinnamon Girl”- The Gentrys
- Record Company- Sun
- Genre: Rock
- Written by Neil Young
- Time: 2:12
- B-side: “I Just Got The News”
- Album- The Gentrys
- Grade: B
- Peaked at #52 12 weeks in the Billboard Hot 100.
The Gentrys were a garage rock band from Memphis. One of their members Jimmy Hart later became a well known manager in television wresting- as Jimmy Hart “The Mouth Of The South.” The Gentrys had 6 Hot 100 singles with 1965’s “Keep On Dancing” #5 their only Top 40 hit. “Cinnamon Girl” is a cover of the Neil Young classic.
slicethelife 
I had this single…not on Sun records though. A hand me down I’m sure. I’m still wondering about the point of covering this.
That is an odd cover- I hadn’t known of its existence until now. This seemed to be an era when bands covered other artists- recent hits- pretty quickly. For every time it worked- say “Proud Mary”- there seems to be ten times when it really didn’t.
In my household this is the version I first grew up with. They didn’t do a bad job…it just isn’t Neil. Yea they didn’t stop and think about Proud Mary…it was a different song when Ike and Tina got through with it.
I think to have the hit- you had to remake it in a different way like Ike and Tina did.. just covering it pretty much as was- wasn’t working… Ray Charles and Stevie doing Beatles tunes worked because they made it their song- did it their way.
That is true Hans…or you might as well make a K-Tel album…which in a sense is what this was.
I might have actually heard this when it came out. I’ll never remember for sure, but I swear there was a version on the radio that was more produced or fine-tuned than Neil’s own version.