Wanted! The Outlaws | ||||
---|---|---|---|---|
![]() | ||||
Compilation album by | ||||
Released | Original: January 12, 1976 Re-issued: February 15, 1996 | |||
Recorded | 1970–1975 (original) 1965–1995 (1996 re-release) | |||
Genre | ||||
Length | 32:37 (original) 60:49 (reissue) | |||
Label | RCA Victor | |||
Producer |
| |||
Waylon Jennings chronology | ||||
| ||||
Jessi Colter chronology | ||||
|
Wanted! The Outlaws is a compilation album by Waylon Jennings, Willie Nelson, Jessi Colter, and Tompall Glaser, released by RCA Records in 1976. The album consists of previously released material with four new songs. Released to capitalize on the new outlaw country movement, Wanted! The Outlaws earned its place in music history by becoming the first country album to be platinum-certified, reaching sales of one million. [1]
The album quickly reached No. 1 on the country charts and peaked at No. 10 on the pop charts, with two hit singles released, "Suspicious Minds" and "Good Hearted Woman." The two peaked at No. 2 and No. 1, respectively, both featuring Jennings. In 1984, this album was among the first to be reissued on compact disc by RCA Records, catalog number PCD1-1321.
By 1973, Waylon Jennings and Willie Nelson had asserted creative control over their music, which they both felt had been hampered for years by the conservative approach taken to their recordings at the Nashville division of RCA Records. In 1972, Nelson left the label for Atlantic Records and recorded a pair of critically acclaimed albums, Shotgun Willie (1973) and the concept album Phases and Stages (1974). With Nelson's popularity increasing, RCA did not want to lose Jennings as well, and granted him the authority to produce his records however he wanted. Jennings released the seminal Honky Tonk Heroes album in 1973, widely considered the first "outlaw" album, and This Time in 1974, which was recorded at Glaser Sound Studios owned by brothers, Tompall, Chuck and Jim an independent studio in Nashville. By 1975, after the explosive success of Nelson's Red Headed Stranger album, a whole new subgenre of country music had emerged called outlaw country. This new movement featured a more "progressive" sound, typified by the music of Jennings and Nelson but also inspired by songwriters like Kris Kristofferson, Billy Joe Shaver, Mickey Newbury, Lee Clayton, David Allan Coe and Townes Van Zandt.
In the wake of Red Headed Stranger and the general media attention the outlaw country movement was generating, producer Jerry Bradley at the RCA studios in Nashville was determined to capitalize on the wealth of Jennings and Nelson recordings that RCA had at their disposal:
Waylon was selling, if we were lucky, two hundred and fifty thousand albums. Willie comes out with Red Headed Stranger and that took off and sold a million records. Jessi Colter put out "I'm Not Lisa" on Capitol. That damn thing sold half a million, or a million, set our butt on fire. We're sitting over there, trying to sell two hundred and fifty thousand records, and we're still struggling. Tompall had a damn record...I never went to one of their concerts, but I can imagine what it looked like, them running up and down the highway doing that. [2]
Bradley approached Jennings about compiling some of his recordings with some old Nelson songs and calling it Wanted! The Outlaws. Jennings okayed the project on the condition that a couple of Glaser tracks be included. [2] Jennings later remarked, "I liked Jerry, but he drove me a little nuts. He didn't have a clue about music, though he always tried to get involved in it, usually by remote control...He was a good merchandiser, though..." [3] Once he got the green light, Bradley went "all in" on the outlaw concept. As author Michael Streissguth observes, "Bradley hired Rolling Stone's Chet Flippo (who would write Jerry Bradley's entry in The Encyclopedia of Country Music in 1998) to pen liner notes, and looked to a Time Life book about the American West as inspiration for the album's iconic album cover, which featured photographs of Colter, Glaser, Jennings, and Nelson on a parched, bullet-riddled wanted poster. [2] In the 2003 documentary Beyond Nashville, Chet Flippo recalled, "The appearance and the marketing of the album were extremely important in making a Nashville album look hip for the first time." In the same film Tompall Glaser stated, "People were so hungry for something different than what was on the radio that they just ate it up. And it sold a million in the first two weeks and it went on up to five million." Jennings, who always viewed the outlaw image with a degree of cynicism, conceded in the audio version of his autobiography Waylon that the movement was rooted in musical integrity:
The cover was pure Old West—Dodge City and Tombstone. Now, we weren't just playing bad guys; we took our stand outside the country music rules, its set ways, locking the door on its own jail cell. We looked like tramps..."Don't fuck with me," was what we were tryin' to say...We loved the energy of rock and roll, but rock had self destructed. Country had gone syrupy. For us, "outlaw" meant standing up for your rights, your own way of doing things. It felt like a different music, and outlaw was as good a description as any. We mostly thought it was funny; Tompall immediately made up outlaw membership certificates...RCA was delighted...At last, an image!
In Nelson's 1988 autobiography Willie, Glaser stated, "Everybody rushed out to buy the Outlaws album: rock and rollers, kids, lockjaw types from the East, people who'd never bought a country album in their whole lives bought that album...Ultimately, I think the outlaw movement or publicity or gimmick or whatever you want to call it did a great thing for country music as a whole, because it opened the way for different styles."
Although many of the songs included on Wanted: The Outlaws were several years old and featured a plethora of producers, the unifying outlaw theme gave the album a cohesion and freshness it might have otherwise lacked. Although the album was predominately upbeat, it begins with the brooding "My Heroes Have Always Been Cowboys," which laments the loneliness of outlaw life as much as it celebrates the freedom of it. In the audio version of his autobiography, Jennings confessed, "It was an oddly downbeat way to start an album, but it seemed to sum up the frontier loneliness that often came hand-in-hand with our ideas of rugged individualism." Nelson would take the song to #1 in 1980 when it appeared on the soundtrack to The Electric Horseman . Jennings also sings Billy Joe Shavers's "Honky Tonk Heroes," the title cut from his classic 1973 LP about "lovable losers" and "no account boozers" who "danced holes in (their) shoes." Nostalgic themes are also found in Nelson's "Yesterday's Wine," the title track from his 1971 concept album of the same name. Nelson's other solo track, "Me and Paul," which also appeared on the Yesterday's Wine album, seemed to echo the outlaw ethos with its tales of suspicious cops, drug busts and lines like, "We'd come to play and not just for the ride." In keeping with the cowboy theme, Glaser tips his hat to Jimmie Rodgers on a rousing version of "T For Texas" and provides some comic relief with the Shel Silverstein nugget "Put Another Log on the Fire." Contrasting with these songs, Colter's selections, including "I'm Looking For Blue Eyes" and "You Mean to Say," address themes of loneliness and heartbreak. Jennings' and Colter's duet on "Suspicious Minds" had originally been released in 1970; at that time the song peaked at #25 on the Billboard country singles chart but, upon its rerelease in 1976, shot up to #2.
The biggest hit single from the album was the Jennings-Nelson duet of "Good Hearted Woman"; it peaked at number one on Billboard's Hot Country Singles and at number 25 on the Billboard Hot 100. It was also awarded with the Single of the Year award by the Country Music Association. Largely written by Jennings, it had served as the title track of his 1972 album and had also been recorded by Nelson for his LP The Words Don't Fit the Picture , also released that same year. According to Joe Nick Patoski's 2008 memoir Willie Nelson , the live performance of "Good Hearted Woman" on Wanted: The Outlaws was recorded at Geno McCoslin's Western Place in Dallas, although there has been speculation that the track was a studio creation because of what appears to be canned audience applause. In reality, Nelson's vocal was overdubbed onto the edited track, which appeared in its original form on Jennings' 1976 live album Waylon Live .
In 1984, RCA reissued the original 11 track album on compact disc. By 1988, the original CD issue was deleted, and RCA issued a truncated version of the album on CD, omitting Waylon & Jessi's "Suspicious Minds", Tompall Glaser's "Put Another Log On The Fire" and Waylon's "Honky Tonk Heroes". The reasons for the deletions are unknown to this day. Wanted! The Outlaws was reissued on CD and cassette tape by RCA for a third time in 1996 (as the remastered 20th Anniversary edition) with all 11 original tracks restored, and augmented with 10 bonus tracks. Only one of these, Steve Earle's "Nowhere Road", had previously been unreleased.
Review scores | |
---|---|
Source | Rating |
Allmusic | ![]() ![]() ![]() ![]() ![]() |
Christgau's Record Guide | B+ [5] |
At the time of the album's release, Joe Nick Patoski of Country Music wrote, "Most of the tracks are from a period when the first seeds of experimentation began to spill in Music City. Thus, a constant clash of traditional and innovative influences dominates each artist's selections, in most instances, finely woven lyrics hiding behind still slick studio concepts." In 2014, Stephen Bletts of Rolling Stone described the album as, "Raucous, rebellious and decidedly uninterested in the blend of pop and country that was storming the charts at the time..." Kurt Wolff of AllMusic observes, "it marked the industry's recognition of the changing times, and as the center point of a campaign to publicize Nashville's new "progressive" breed, it worked like a charm."
Wanted! The Outlaws reached at No. 1 on Billboard's Top Country Albums chart where it stayed for six weeks. In November 1976, it became the first country album to be awarded the platinum certification by RIAA, which introduced the platinum certification that year. [6]
Waylon Arnold Jennings was an American singer, songwriter, musician, and actor. He is considered one of the pioneers of the outlaw movement in country music.
Outlaw country is a subgenre of American country music created by a small group of iconoclastic artists active in the 1970s and early 1980s, known collectively as the outlaw movement, who fought for and won their creative freedom outside of the Nashville establishment that dictated the sound of most country music of the era. Willie Nelson, Waylon Jennings, Merle Haggard, Johnny Cash, Kris Kristofferson, Johnny Paycheck and David Allan Coe were among the movement's most commercially successful members.
Thomas Paul "Tompall" Glaser was an American country singer who was a key figure in the 1970s outlaw country movement.
Mirriam Johnson, known professionally as Jessi Colter, is an American country singer who is best known for her collaborations with her second husband, country musician Waylon Jennings, and for her 1975 crossover hit "I'm Not Lisa".
Cedartown, Georgia is a studio album by American country music artist Waylon Jennings, released in 1971 on RCA Nashville.
Singer of Sad Songs is a studio album by American country music artist Waylon Jennings, released in 1970 on RCA Nashville.
Ladies Love Outlaws is an album by American country music artist Waylon Jennings, released on RCA Nashville in 1972. Together with Jennings' previous album Good Hearted Woman, it marks his transition toward his Outlaw Country image and style. "Ladies Love Outlaws" coined the use of the term "Outlaw" to refer to the country music subgenre, which was developing at the time of its release.
Lonesome, On'ry and Mean is a studio album by American country music artist Waylon Jennings, released on RCA Victor in 1973. It was, after Good Hearted Woman and Ladies Love Outlaws, the third in a series of albums which were to establish Jennings as one of the most prominent representatives of the outlaw country movement. Photographer Mick Rock shot the album's cover.
Honky Tonk Heroes is a country music album by Waylon Jennings, released in 1973 on RCA Victor. With the exception of the final track on the album, "We Had It All", all of the songs on the album were written or co-written by Billy Joe Shaver. The album is considered an important piece in the development of the outlaw sub-genre in country music as it revived the honky tonk music of Nashville and added elements of rock and roll to it.
This Time is a studio album by American country music artist Waylon Jennings, released on RCA Victor in 1974, at the peak of the outlaw country movement. It was produced by Jennings and Willie Nelson.
Leather and Lace is a duet album by Waylon Jennings and Jessi Colter, released on RCA Records in 1981.
Waylon Live is a live album by Waylon Jennings, released on RCA Victor in 1976.
Ol' Waylon is a studio album by American country music artist Waylon Jennings. It was released on RCA Victor in 1977. It eventually became one of Jennings' highest-selling albums, due in no small part to the phenomenal success of the chart-topping "Luckenbach, Texas ." It was also the singer's fourth solo album in a row to reach the top of the country charts, remaining there for thirteen weeks and becoming country music's first platinum album by any single solo artist.
Black on Black is a studio album by American country music artist Waylon Jennings, released on RCA Victor in 1982.
It's Only Rock & Roll is an album by Waylon Jennings, released on RCA Victor in 1983.
Nashville Rebel is a box set by Waylon Jennings, released on RCA Nashville through Legacy Recordings in 2006. According to AllMusic's Stephen Thomas Erlewine, it is "the first comprehensive, multi-label Waylon Jennings retrospective ever assembled," comprising ninety-two songs recorded between [1958 and 1994, with selections from the majority of the singer's recording career. The first track of the box set is the Buddy Holly-produced "Jole Blon," released in 1958, while the last is "I Do Believe," a song produced by Don Was that was included on The Highwaymen's 1995 release, The Road Goes On Forever. The other material on the box set covers Jennings' career chronologically, with songs ranging from his years on RCA's roster to later compositions from his short-lived stay at Epic Records; it ignores, however, the tracks from Jennings albums released on independent labels. The majority of the singer's charting singles are included in the package, as are collaborations such as "Mamas Don't Let Your Babies Grow Up to Be Cowboys" with Willie Nelson and "Highwayman" with The Highwaymen. A notable addition is the previously unreleased "The Greatest Cowboy of Them All," a 1978 duet with Johnny Cash which was later recorded by Cash alone for A Believer Sings the Truth (1979) and The Mystery of Life (1991); two others, "It's Sure Been Fun" and "People in Dallas Got Hair," had never been released in the United States. Nashville Rebel was released on four CDs, with a 140-page booklet and liner notes by Rich Kienzle and Lenny Kaye.
The Waylors, later Waymore's Outlaws, is a country music band, best known as the backing and recording band of country music singer Waylon Jennings. Jennings formed the band in 1961, consisting of Jerry Gropp on the guitar and Richie Albright on the drums after moving to Phoenix, Arizona. The band earned a local fan base during its appearances on the night club JD's.
"Lovin' Her Was Easier " is a song written, composed, first recorded, and first released by Kris Kristofferson. It was also recorded and released by Roger Miller, who included it on his album The Best of Roger Miller and released it as a single in July 1971. Ten years later, it was recorded by Tompall & the Glaser Brothers for the album Lovin' Her Was Easier.
Robby Turner is an American pedal steel guitarist, best known for his work with Waylon Jennings and his contributions to recordings by many other artists.
Hazel Ruth Boone, also known as Hazel Smith was an American country music journalist, publicist, singer-songwriter, television and radio show host, and cookbook author. She is sometimes credited with creating the term "outlaw country," which has been used to describe country music by performers including Tompall & the Glaser Brothers, Waylon Jennings and Willie Nelson.