Mickey Gilley – Don’t The Girls All Get Prettier At Closing Time

“Don’t the Girls All Get Prettier at Closing Time” is a song written by Baker Knight, and recorded by American country music artist Mickey Gilley. It was released in January 1976 as the first single from the album Gilley’s Smokin. The song was Gilley’s fifth No. 1 on the Billboard Hot Country Singles chart. The song’s one week atop the chart was part of a 12-week stay in the country chart’s top 40.

The song is a lament about loneliness and late-night desperation in finding a desirable significant other in a barroom. As the night progresses, and the singer consumes more drinks, he continuously lowers his standards. Eventually he finds a willing and (what he thinks to be) suitable partner—only to find that when he wakes up, he has taken home one of the ugliest women in the bar and vows never to “do that anymore.”

From the album Gilley’s Smokin’
B-side “Where Do You Go to Lose a Heartache”
Released January 1976
Recorded 1975
Genre Country
Length 2:56
Label Playboy
Songwriter(s) Baker Knight
Producer(s) Eddie Kilroy

Mickey Gilley – Don’t The Girls All Get Prettier At Closing Time lyrics

One… two… one, two, three, go…

Don’t the girls all get prettier at closing time
Don’t they all begin to look like movie stars
Don’t the girls all get prettier at closing time
When the change starts takin’ place
It puts a glow on every face
Of the fallen angels of the backstreet bars

If I could rate ’em on a scale from one to ten
I’m lookin’ for a nine, but eight could work right in
A few more drinks and I might slip to five or even four
But when tomorrow mornin’ comes
And I wake up with a number one
I swear I’ll never do it anymore

Don’t the girls all get prettier at closing time
Don’t they all begin to look like movie stars
Don’t the girls all get prettier at closing time
When the change starts takin’ place
It puts a glow on every face
Of the fallen angels of the backstreet bars

I don’t mean to criticize the girls at all
‘Cause I know Robert Redford even overhauled
But we all picture in our minds a girl that looks just right
Now ain’t it funny, ain’t it strange
The way a man’s opinions change
When he starts to face that mornin’ light

Don’t the girls all get prettier at closing time
Don’t they all begin to look like movie stars
Don’t the girls all get prettier at closing time
When the change starts takin’ place
It puts a glow on every face
Of the fallen angels of the backstreet bars
The fallen angels of those backstreet bars