Ray Price wasn't just another guy in a cowboy hat. When you look back at the late 1950s, country music was at a weird crossroads. The raw, fiddle-heavy honky-tonk sound was starting to feel a bit "old hat" to the urbanizing crowds, and the slick "Nashville Sound" was just beginning to peek over the horizon. Right in the middle of that friction, we got Heartaches by the Number, a track that basically changed the trajectory of the genre.
It’s catchy. It’s bouncy. But if you actually listen to the lyrics, it’s arguably one of the most depressing songs to ever hit the Billboard charts. That was the magic of Ray Price songs during this era—they paired absolute emotional devastation with a beat you could shuffle to.
The Guy Who Refused to Play it Safe
Ray Price had huge boots to fill. Early in his career, he was roommates with Hank Williams. Think about that for a second. He was literally living with the blueprint of country music. After Hank passed away, Price even fronted the Drifting Cowboys. It would have been so easy to just be a Hank clone for the rest of his life. Honestly, most people probably expected him to.
Instead, he invented the "Ray Price Shuffle."
You know the sound. It’s that driving 4/4 rhythm, usually led by a walking bass line and a specific way the fiddle hangs in the air. This rhythm became the heartbeat of Heartaches by the Number. Released in 1959, the song was written by Harlan Howard, a man who famously defined country music as "three chords and the truth." Howard had originally pitched the song elsewhere, but Price’s version became the definitive one for country fans. It spent 40 weeks on the charts. That’s nearly a year of people listening to a man count his miseries on repeat.
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Breaking Down Heartaches by the Number
The structure of the song is a masterclass in songwriting. It’s not just a vague "I'm sad" ballad. It’s a literal inventory of pain.
- Heartache number one is the hope that he'll come back.
- Heartache number two is the realization that he won't.
- Number three is the public embarrassment of being left.
- Number four is the cycle starting all over again.
It’s relatable because it’s systematic. Everyone who has ever been through a messy breakup knows that grief isn't a single wave; it's a series of specific, numbered events that happen throughout the day. Price delivers these lines with a polished, almost effortless baritone that makes the pain feel sophisticated rather than desperate.
Interestingly, Guy Mitchell covered the song almost immediately and took it to number one on the Pop charts. While Mitchell’s version is great, it lacks the "grit under the fingernails" that Price brought to the table. In the Ray Price version, the steel guitar (played by Jimmy Day) cries in a way that Mitchell’s pop orchestra just couldn't replicate.
Why Ray Price Songs Sound Different
If you listen to Heartaches by the Number back-to-back with his earlier stuff like "Release Me," you can hear the evolution. Price was moving away from the nasal, high-lonesome sound of the Appalachian mountains and moving toward something broader. He was adding strings. He was using backup singers. He was making country music "uptown."
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Purists hated it. They called him a sellout. They said he was ruining the music.
But Price didn't care. He knew that the audience was changing. People weren't just listening to music in rural dance halls anymore; they were listening on high-fidelity home stereo systems. The production had to keep up. This transition is why his catalog is so diverse. You have the hardcore honky-tonk of "Crazy Arms," the rhythmic shuffle of Heartaches by the Number, and then the full-blown orchestral crooning of "For the Good Times."
The Harlan Howard Connection
You can't talk about these songs without mentioning Harlan Howard. Howard was a factory worker who wrote songs on his lunch breaks. He understood the working-class psyche better than almost anyone in Nashville. When he brought Heartaches by the Number to Price, he wasn't bringing him a poem; he was bringing him a blueprint of the human condition.
The song's success solidified the partnership between the "poet of the common man" and the "Cherokee Cowboy." It proved that you could have a massive hit that was both commercially viable and emotionally honest. This wasn't "bubblegum" country. It was sophisticated misery.
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The Legacy of the Shuffle
If you walk into a honky-tonk in Austin or Nashville today, you will still hear the Ray Price shuffle. Every modern traditionalist—from George Strait to Midland—owes a direct debt to what Price was doing in 1959.
Why does it still work?
Because it’s functional music. It’s designed for the dance floor. Heartaches by the Number is the perfect tempo for a two-step. You can grab a partner, spin around the floor, and for two and a half minutes, your own heartaches don't feel quite so heavy because you're moving to the beat of someone else’s.
What People Get Wrong About Price
A lot of folks think Ray Price just "went pop" because he wanted more money. That's a huge oversimplification. If you read interviews with his longtime bandmates, they’ll tell you he was a perfectionist. He wanted the best musicians, the best arrangements, and the best sound quality possible. He felt that country music deserved the same respect and production value as jazz or classical music. Heartaches by the Number was a stepping stone toward that goal. It was a "hit" in every sense of the word, but it didn't sacrifice its soul to get there.
Actionable Steps for Exploring the Catalog
If you're just getting into this era of music, don't stop at the greatest hits. To truly understand the impact of Ray Price, you have to look at how he influenced the "Shuffle" sub-genre.
- Listen to the 1959 original first. Pay close attention to the way the bass and the drums lock together. That’s the "Price Shuffle."
- Compare it to the Guy Mitchell version. Notice how the "feel" changes when you remove the steel guitar and add the whistling. It turns a tragedy into a jaunty tune.
- Check out "Crazy Arms." This was his first big hit (1956) and it’s the bridge between Hank Williams and the more polished sound of Heartaches by the Number.
- Dive into the lyrics of Harlan Howard. Look for other songs he wrote during this period, like "I Fall to Pieces." You’ll start to see a pattern in how he used simple, numbered, or categorized emotions to tell a story.
- Watch old footage. Look for clips of the Cherokee Cowboys on the Pet Milk Grand Ole Opry shows. Seeing the band in their Nudie suits helps you understand the visual "brand" Price was building alongside the music.
The real power of Heartaches by the Number lies in its longevity. It’s a song that sounds just as good on a jukebox in a dive bar as it does on a high-end streaming setup. It’s a reminder that while the ways we count our heartaches might change, the numbers always seem to add up the same way.