"Leave Me Alone (Ruby Red Dress)" is a 1973 song written and first recorded by American singer-songwriter

Linda Laurie Linda Maxine Laurie was an American singer and songwriter, best known for the novelty record "Ambrose (Part 5)", which went to #52 on the '' Billboard'' chart while she was still a high school student in 1959. "Ambrose (Part 5)" While attendin ...

. It was famously covered by Australian-American singer

Helen Reddy Helen Maxine Reddy (25 October 194129 September 2020) was an Australian-American singer, actress, television host, and activist. Born in Melbourne to a showbusiness family, Reddy started her career as an entertainer at age four. She sang on rad ...

several months later; Reddy's cover was a million-selling, Gold-certified

hit single A hit song, also known as a hit record, hit single or simply a hit, is a recorded song or instrumental that becomes broadly popular or well-known. Although ''hit song'' means any widely played or big-selling song, the specific term ''hit record' ...

. Laurie recorded "Leave Me Alone (Ruby Red Dress)" for

MCA Records MCA Records was an American record label owned by MCA Inc., which later became part of Universal Music Group. Pre-history MCA Inc., a powerful talent agency and a television production company, entered the recorded music business in 1962 wit ...

in the summer of 1973. The song was shopped to Helen Reddy who recorded it for her '' Long Hard Climb'' album which was released August 1973, and the track was issued as a single that October.

Helen Reddy version

Capitol Records Capitol Records, LLC (known legally as Capitol Records, Inc. until 2007) is an American record label distributed by Universal Music Group through its Capitol Music Group imprint. It was founded as the first West Coast-based record label of note ...

issued "Leave Me Alone" as the follow-up single to Reddy's No. 1 hit "

Delta Dawn "Delta Dawn" is a song written by musician Larry Collins and country songwriter Alex Harvey (country musician), Alex Harvey. The first notable recording of the song was in 1971 by American singer and actress Bette Middler, Bette Midler for her ...

" despite the misgivings of Reddy herself who felt "Leave Me Alone" was a thematic retread of "Delta Dawn" as both songs concern a Southern woman - alliteratively named - whose reason has been undermined by an ill-fated tryst. As well, Reddy found the song's chorus with its repetition of the phrase "leave me alone" monotonous. Capitol Records was correct in believing the resemblance to Reddy's precedent hit would work in "Leave Me Alone"'s favor as the song reached the American Top Ten chart six weeks after its single release. It hit No.1 in ''

Cash Box ''Cashbox'', also known as ''Cash Box'', was an American music industry trade magazine, originally published weekly from July 1942 to November 1996. Ten years after its dissolution, it was revived and continues as ''Cashbox Magazine'', an online ...

'' and rose to No. 3 on the ''Billboard'' Hot 100,''Joel Whitburn's Top Pop Singles 1955-1990'' - making ''Long Hard Climb'' the only one of Reddy's albums to feature two Top Ten songs. "Leave Me Alone" became Reddy's third US single release to be certified

Gold Gold is a chemical element with the symbol Au (from la, aurum) and atomic number 79. This makes it one of the higher atomic number elements that occur naturally. It is a bright, slightly orange-yellow, dense, soft, malleable, and ductile met ...

for sales of over one million units and was also the second of Reddy's six consecutive No. 1 songs on the ''Billboard'' Easy Listening Chart. She would eventually score eight No.1 Billboard Easy Listening/Adult Contemporary songs overall. In Australia, "Leave Me Alone" followed "Delta Dawn" as Reddy's second consecutive - and final - No. 1 ranked song, topping the charts dated 7 & 14 January 1974. "Leave Me Alone" was the first Helen Reddy single to build momentum in the UK with six weeks in February and March 1974 spent approaching the UK Top 50; however the single ultimately failed to reach the chart. The song was the subject of a nationwide contest in America in which listeners would submit to their local radio station their estimation of how many times Reddy sang the phrase "leave me alone" in the song; submissions of the correct answer - which Reddy states is 43 - were eligible for a trip for two to see Helen in concert. Reddy sang this song as a skit on ''

The Carol Burnett Show ''The Carol Burnett Show'' is an American variety/sketch comedy television show that originally ran on CBS from September 11, 1967, to March 29, 1978, for 279 episodes, and again with nine episodes in fall 1991. It starred Carol Burnett, Harvey ...

'', with the show's cast (

Vicki Lawrence Vicki Ann Lawrence ( Axelrad; born March 26, 1949), sometimes credited as Vicki Lawrence Schultz, is an American actress, comedian, and singer. She is best known for her character Mama (Thelma Harper). Lawrence originated multitudes of charact ...

Harvey Korman Harvey Herschel Korman (February 15, 1927May 29, 2008) was an American actor and comedian who performed in television and film productions. His big break was being a featured performer on CBS' ''The Danny Kaye Show'', but he is best remembered f ...

, and

Tim Conway Thomas Daniel "Tim" Conway (December 15, 1933 – May 14, 2019) was an American actor, comedian, writer, and director. From 1966 to 2012 he appeared in more than 100 TV shows, TV series and films. Among his more notable roles, he portrayed the ...

) singing the chorus, which gets interrupted by Reddy, who tells the guests that they all sounded "TERRIBLE". When Reddy came out of retirement in 2013, playing US club dates with an act focused on songs she'd recorded which were not released as singles, she cited "Leave Me Alone (Ruby Red Dress)" as "one song I will never ever sing again" disparaging its lyrical repetitiveness: "that sort of songwriting doesn’t do much for me, but it was a hit. However, I don’t have to sing it anymore if I don’t want to, and I don’t want to."

Chart history

Weekly charts

Year-end charts

Other covers

Country music Country (also called country and western) is a genre of popular music that originated in the Southern and Southwestern United States in the early 1920s. It primarily derives from blues, church music such as Southern gospel and spirituals, ...

artist Arlene Harden covered "Leave Me Alone (Ruby Red Dress)" in a

Nashville Nashville is the capital city of the U.S. state of Tennessee and the seat of Davidson County. With a population of 689,447 at the 2020 U.S. census, Nashville is the most populous city in the state, 21st most-populous city in the U.S., and the ...

session produced by Frank Jones on 10 May 1974 with the track serving as her debut release on Capitol Records that June; it fell short of hit status with a No. 72 peak on the ''Billboard'' C&W chart in August 1974.

Samantha Sang Cheryl Lau Sang (born 5 August 1951), known professionally as Samantha Sang, is an Australian singer. She had an earlier career as a teenage singer under the stage name Cheryl Gray, before adopting the stage name she is more widely known as in 1 ...

recorded "Leave Me Alone (Ruby Red Dress)" for her 1975 debut album ''Samantha Sang and Rocked the World''.

References

External links

* {{authority control 1973 songs 1973 singles Helen Reddy songs Cashbox number-one singles Number-one singles in Australia Capitol Records singles Songs about loneliness