On
A Legend in My Time, his third album for RCA Victor,
Ronnie Milsap followed through on the sound of its predecessor,
Pure Love, but he switched up the tempo a little. Where
Pure Love was unabashedly romantic, there was a bit more variety here -- not just in terms of speed, since there were some sprightly numbers here, but also within the ballads, which now showed some signs of heartbreak. While he was changing his tune slightly, when he stayed in his sweet territory he got a little sticky, as on his take on
Olivia Newton-John's "I Honestly Love You," but it is nowhere near as slick as his later soft crossover material. He also got a little silly on "Country Cookin'," a Nashville spin on "Memphis Soul Stew," but, overall, this excelled both in strength and variety of material, highlighted by the singles "Too Late to Worry, Too Blue to Cry" and "(I'd Be) A Legend in My Time," but also the good barroom weeper "The Busiest Memory in Time," "She Came Here for the Change," and his original "I'm Still Not Over You." It was a very good mainstream country-pop record -- good enough to win the CMA's Album of the Year for 1975 -- and remains one of the highlights in
Milsap's extensive catalog.