1975 · Behind the Songs
The lead single from No Way to Treat a Lady stalled at number thirty-five — but it may be the best song on the album.
Every hitmaker has a single that should have been bigger. For Helen Reddy, “Bluebird” is the prime candidate: the lead single from her January 1975 album No Way to Treat a Lady, written by Leon Russell, and a record that stalled at number thirty-five on the pop chart. It reached number five on the adult contemporary listing — her audience was still listening — but as a lead single it was, at the time, the least successful of her career. The irony is that it may be the best song on the album: a Russell composition with real wings, sung by a vocalist at the height of her powers. Sometimes the charts get it wrong.
Leon Russell was the songwriter’s songwriter of the era. By 1975 he had already given the world “A Song for You” and “Tight Rope,” his 1972 hit, and he was riding the success of Will O’ the Wisp, the 1975 album that carried “Lady Blue.” He wrote “This Masquerade,” which would win a Grammy in 1977 via George Benson’s version. Russell’s style was unmistakable: gospel chords, a shambling piano, and melodies that sounded unearthed rather than written. “Bluebird” came from that same workshop — a song about freedom and flight, built on one of his most graceful tunes. That Helen Reddy, the polished pop balladeer, wanted to record it says everything about Russell’s reach.
No Way to Treat a Lady arrived in January 1975 with “Bluebird” as its lead single — the first taste of the new album, the song chosen to set the tone. The choice made sense on paper: Russell was hot, the song was beautiful, and Reddy’s adult contemporary audience, which carried it to number five on that chart, embraced it. But pop radio, which had taken her to number one three times, shrugged; the record stopped at number thirty-five on the Hot 100. No lead single from a Reddy album had ever done worse. For a singer coming off a run of smashes, it must have stung — even if the album itself had a second arrow in its quiver.
The song itself is a small marvel. The bluebird of the title is freedom made feathered — happiness that cannot be caged, love that cannot be kept — and Russell’s melody gives the image real lift. Reddy sings it with a lightness she rarely showed on her bigger ballads; there is no belt, no climax, just a sustained, floating ease. It is the sound of a singer trusting the song completely. In a catalog built on emotional directness, “Bluebird” is a moment of impressionism, and it suits her more than anyone might have predicted.
The album’s second single told the rest of the story. “Ain’t No Way to Treat a Lady” became the hit “Bluebird” had not been, and it is the song the album is remembered for. There is no shame in that — albums often work this way, the lead single softening the ground for the follow-up — but it left “Bluebird” in an odd position: the opening statement of a successful album that everyone remembers for its second sentence. Reddy’s career, by 1975, was a machine that needed hits; “Bluebird” was a song that needed listeners. The two needs did not coincide.
Why did it stall? The theories are all plausible and none provable. Perhaps Russell’s shambling grace was too subtle for pop radio in the winter of 1975. Perhaps Reddy’s audience, trained on big ballads, did not know what to do with a song that refused to climax. Perhaps the record was simply too beautiful to be a hit — a paradox the music business produces regularly. What is certain is that the song’s failure was commercial, not artistic. The number five adult contemporary peak proves the audience that listened closely loved it; the number thirty-five pop peak proves only that fewer people listened closely.
Russell’s own career gives the song good company. “A Song for You” became a standard, “This Masquerade” won its Grammy, and “Tight Rope” and “Lady Blue” were genuine hits — but Russell always wrote songs that outgrew their chart positions. “Bluebird” belongs with the best of them: a composition that sounds inevitable, as if it had always existed and Russell merely found it. That Reddy heard it and claimed it is a credit to her ear. The great interpreters are defined as much by what they choose as by what they sing, and choosing “Bluebird” was a choice of real taste.
What to listen for: the float. Reddy’s vocal never pushes; it rides Russell’s melody the way the bird rides the air, and the arrangement gives her room to glide. Notice the absence of a big finish — the song ends the way it lived, lightly. Then play it again and notice what you missed the first time: the gospel tinge in the chords, the patience of the phrasing, the confidence of a singer who does not need to prove she can belt. “Bluebird” was not a hit. It was something better: a perfect record.
The album around it deserves a final word. No Way to Treat a Lady arrived in January 1975 at a moment when she could do no wrong — “I Am Woman,” “Delta Dawn,” and “Angie Baby” had all gone to number one, and she was hosting her own television specials. In that context, a lead single peaking at thirty-five was a tremor, not an earthquake; the album still produced its big hit, and Reddy’s reign continued. But “Bluebird” remains the record’s conscience — the track that reminds you what the whole enterprise was for. Not the charts, not the specials, not the streak. The song. Play it once for the chart story; play it again for the song.