Act Naturally

Johnny Russell wrote it after telling his girlfriend, when he broke a date to go to Los Angeles, that they were going to put him in the movies and make him a big star. His producer turned it down, and two years passed before anyone recorded it. Voni Morrison, who worked with Owens, thought it natural for him, and she shares the writing credit. Owens disliked it at first, but Don Rich liked Russell's demo, and Owens recorded it with the Buckaroos at Capitol Studios in Hollywood on 12 February 1963.

It was released as a non-album single on 11 March, charted on 13 April and began the first of four non-consecutive weeks at number one on 15 June. It spent 28 weeks on the country chart. It was the first record on which Rich played lead guitar.

The Beatles recorded it on 17 June 1965 in thirteen takes for the UK version of Help!, with Ringo Starr on lead vocal. In the US it was the B side of Yesterday. Starr has performed it on every tour of his All-Starr Band since 1989, the year he recorded a duet with Owens that reached number 27 on the country chart and was nominated for a Grammy.

Live

It was the first song after the introduction at the Carnegie Hall concert of 1966 and was played again at Owens's 70th birthday celebration in Bakersfield in 1999.