Perspective (Rick Nelson album)

Perspective is the seventeenth studio album by American singer Rick Nelson, and his eleventh for Decca Records.

The album was a departure from Nelson's previous rockabilly records and an experiment in a more contemporary orchestral style. Like Nelson's prior album Another Side of Rick, it was produced by John Boylan. Boylan selected a number of contemporary songs for the album, including four by Randy Newman, who was not yet a well known songwriter. He also contributed two of his own songs, while Nelson's wife Kris performed vocals on "Hello to the Wind" (a joint Boylan/Nelson composition) and supplied album artwork. The album was recorded at TTG, Wally Heider, and Sunset Sound Studios in Hollywood between March-April 1968 and released in late August. Once sessions were complete, Telecaster icon James Burton left Nelson's band after an 11-year friendship and focused on his round-the-clock session work with the Wrecking Crew until Elvis Presley requested he join his TCB band ahead of his July-August 1969 comeback engagement at the International Hotel in Las Vegas.

Neither of the two Boylan-produced albums were a commercial success. Although Nelson grew to dislike Perspective's overproduced style, he credits the album with clarifying his future musical direction. "Perspective with those songs was a complete experiment and those Steve Miller type sound effects between tracks were my idea.... I'm not sorry I did those things because, if anything, it made up my mind as to the way I wanted to go... I just simplified the whole thing and went back to the formula of drums, bass, and guitar. That's where I'd always been most effective."

The album was released on compact disc by Ace Records on September 29, 1998, as tracks 13 through 23 on a pairing of two albums on one CD with tracks 1 through 12 consisting of Nelson's 1967 studio album, Another Side of Rick. Bear Family included the album in the 2008 For You: The Decca Years box set.