"She Thinks I Still Care" is a country song written by Dickey Lee and Steve Duffy. First popularized by George Jones, the song has been recorded by many artists, including Connie Francis, Anne Murray, Elvis Presley and Patty Loveless.

George Jones version

Jones first heard the song when Jack Clement played it for him at Gulf Coast Studio in Beaumont, which Clement owned with Bill Hall. The song had been written by Dickey Lee Lipscomb and Steve Duffy, two professional songwriters under contract to Clement's publishing company, so Clement was eager for Jones to record it. According to Allen, Jones had little interest, responding, "I don't like it too much. It's got too many damn 'just becauses' in it. I don't think nobody really wants to hear that shit, do you?" Undeterred, both Clement and Hall continued to pitch the song to Jones. Raymond Nalley, brother of Gulf Coast session musician Luther Nalley, later recalled: In his essay for 1994 Sony retrospective The Essential George Jones: The Spirit of Country, Rich Kienzle also states that Jones was underwhelmed by the song after Clement had "decided not to play George the tape but to sing him the song, altering the melody as he sang it to give it a stronger country feel." Jones himself always insisted he had no doubts about the song. Recalling his first impression of the tune, he insisted in the 1989 documentary Same Ole Me, "Boy, I just flipped! I said, 'Golly, lemme have this thing.'" In the 1994 video retrospective Golden Hits, he added, "It knocked me out. I couldn't wait to get into the studio." The song was released in April 1962, his first single release on United Artists after leaving Mercury, and it remained on the Billboard survey for twenty-three weeks, six of them at #1. In his autobiography I Lived to Tell It All, the singer wrote, "For years after I recorded it, the song was my most requested, and it became what people in my business call a 'career record,' the song that firmly establishes your identity with the public." The B-side, "Sometimes You Just Can't Win", reached No. 17 on the C&W chart. "She Thinks I Still Care" was one of seven records George would chart in 1962, and in the fall of 1963 he would travel to New York City and perform the song on Jimmy Dean's ABC network show. In 1999, this version of the song was inducted into the Grammy Hall of Fame.

Cover versions

Chart performance

George Jones

Connie Francis

Anne Murray