Waylon Jennings - Original Album Classics (2008) 5CD Box Set

×

Waylon Jennings - Original Album Classics (2008) 5CD Box Set

Close

Waylon Jennings spent 20 years with RCA Records, signing with the label in 1965 and remaining with them until 1985, when he moved on to record for MCA Records. Needless to say, his key creative years were with RCA, particularly after 1972, when Jennings renegotiated his deal to give him more artistic control over what he produced. This box set package includes five of the resulting RCA albums that Jennings produced between 1973 and 1978, including 1973's Lonesome, On'ry and Mean, 1974's This Time and The Ramblin' Man, 1977's Ol' Waylon, and 1978's Waylon & Willie (with Willie Nelson), with whatever bonus tracks that were included on RCA's individual CD reissues of each album. It's a whole lot of Waylon, probably more than the casual listener would need and serious fans would most likely already have all of, but a big chunk of Jennings' legacy is here, so it makes an easy way to connect with his most creative period as an artist in one simple swoop.

Review by Steve Leggett, Allmusic.com

×

Waylon Jennings - Original Album Classics (2008) 5CD Box Set

Close

Lonesome, On'ry and Mean is the quintessential Waylon Jennings outlaw record. Waylon produced the set – the first unfettered by the bonds of RCA – with his own band, and the results are nothing less than electrifying. Steve Young, the perennial country and folk music outsider, may have penned the title cut, but Waylon's delivery as an anthem bears in it all of his years of frustration at not being able to make the music he wanted to. Fury is a better word for what is heard in the grain of the song's lyrics. Young's own version is devastating, but this one is transcendent. (And why is it that Travis Tritt was picked to sing this at Waylon's memorial instead of Young, who was also present? Talk about misguided justice.) But the boundaries between rock & roll and country come down once again on this album in Kris Kristofferson's "Me & Bobby McGee," as folk and post-psychedelia meet Texas in Mickey Newbury's "San Francisco Mabel Joy" and the broken, road-weary pop honky tonk balladry of Danny O'Keefe's "Good Time Charlie's Got the Blues." Add to this Johnny Cash's "Gone to Denver" and Willie Nelson's "Pretend I Never Happened," and you have an outsider's dream. That the rest of the recording is just as consistent, just as seamless in its execution, production, and delivery, makes Lonesome, On'ry and Mean the first seriously pitched battle in the 1970s country music wars. And this one went to Jennings and his fans, hands down.

Thom Jurek, Allmusic.com

×

Waylon Jennings - Original Album Classics (2008) 5CD Box Set

Close

This Time appeared just as outlaw hit its stride, thanks in large part to the excellent Honky Tonk Heroes. If this record isn't its equal, it's still pretty wonderful all the same. Part of the record's flaw is its heavy reliance on Willie Nelson – actually, not just on Willie, but on Phases and Stages, which is the source of no less than four of this record's six songs. Granted, these are great songs, and Waylon's versions are hard to fault, but they nevertheless give the record a slightly recycled feeling. Fortunately, these songs are surrounded by excellent material, such as the number one single "This Time." Overall, This Time is fairly muted and deliberate, surprising for an album coming on the heels of the defiant Honky Tonk Heroes. Even the songs that swagger, like Billy Joe Shaver's "Slow Rollin' Low," are laid-back, and the whole thing is fairly reflective (appropriate, if it uses a divorce album as its template). It's not that the monochromaticity makes it a lesser affair than its predecessor, yet the whole thing does feel a bit reserved and not quite as overpowering as a sequel to Honky Tonk Heroes should be. Still, it's a first-rate record – perhaps not a classic, but a subdued, understated album unlike anything in his catalog.

Stephen Thomas Erlewine, Allmusic.com

×

Waylon Jennings - Original Album Classics (2008) 5CD Box Set

Close

If you look at the cover of The Ramblin' Man, you would think that Waylon Jennings had been a ramblin' man, riding the top of the charts, for years, maybe decades. He looks worn out, whether it's on the close-up on the cover, or the back-cover shot of him drunkenly playing solitaire. In truth, it would be another album before he hit the top of the country charts and before outlaw country became hip. Still, this is the record where it all came home. If he had created a sketch of outlaw on Honky Tonk Heroes, he perfected the marketable version of it here, making it a little slicker, a little more commercial, and a whole lot more unstoppable. If the songs aren't the equal of Honky Tonk Heroes or even This Time, The Ramblin' Man has a wilder sound and a greater diversity of songs that make it seem more unruly than its immediate predecessor and more blatantly outlaw. This contains, after all, his first flat-out rock cover, with a good take on the Allman Brothers' "Midnight Rider," plus songs that play into the image of what an outlaw country singer is. There are moments of reflection, yet even those feed into the outlaw picture. Too bad many of the album tracks wind up being agreeable filler instead of knockouts. There aren't any bad cuts, and the entire thing holds together quite well, but it doesn't add up to a moment of transcendence the way Honky Tonk Heroes or its successor would. Still, with "I'm a Ramblin' Man," "Rainy Day Woman," and the heartbreaking "Amanda" on its side, plus highlights like "Oklahoma Sunshine," this is a first-rate Waylon record.

Stephen Thomas Erlewine, Allmusic.com

×

Waylon Jennings - Original Album Classics (2008) 5CD Box Set

Close

Ol' Waylon was released when Waylon Jennings had become a superstar. Outlaw was still popular, perhaps at its peak, but it was no longer the movement that it had been just a few short years before. As if offering proof, Waylon cut his most formulaic album since the early '60s, a record that satisfied the demands of outlaw without ever stretching them. Since this was recorded at a near-peak of not only his popularity but his power, there are some great moments on Ol' Waylon, particularly on the lead single "Luckenbach, Texas (Back to the Basics of Love)," a wonderful reminiscence of times back, "If You See Me Getting Smaller," and "I Think I'm Gonna Kill Myself." The rest of the record is a little formulaic and reliant on covers, sometimes enjoyably (including a version of Kenny Rogers' "Lucille"), sometimes not as much ("Sweet Caroline" was never suited for Waylon's style). Overall, Ol' Waylon is pretty enjoyable, but it winds up feeling a little hollow, as if Jennings was trying to give the audience what it wanted. There are enough good moments to make it worthwhile, not just to the dedicated but for some casual fans enamored of the outlaw years, but it's still an album that gets by more on its style than substance.

Stephen Thomas Erlewine, Allmusic.com

×

Waylon Jennings - Original Album Classics (2008) 5CD Box Set

Close

It sat on the top of the country charts for 11 weeks and went double platinum, making it one of the biggest hits in either Waylon Jennings' or Willie Nelson's catalog. Years after its initial 1978 release, Waylon & Willie remains one of their biggest-selling albums, but its perennial popularity has more to do with their iconic status – something this album deliberately played up – than the quality of the music, which is, overall, merely good. Released in early 1978, a few months after Jennings' Ol' Waylon spent 13 weeks on the top of the charts in the summer of 1977, thanks in part to the hit single "Luckenbach, Texas" featuring a chorus sung by Nelson, the album was intended as a celebration of the peak of outlaw, but in retrospect, it looks like where the movement was beginning to slide into predictability, even if both singers are more or less in command of their talents here. Though still at the peak of his popularity, Waylon had begun to slip slightly creatively starting with the very good, but not great, Are You Ready for the Country, which suggested that he was having a little harder time getting a full album of consistently great material together. The patchwork nature of this album suggests that he still had the problem, but since it was divided into three solo songs apiece and five duets, this plays to his strengths, because the limited number of new songs doesn't give him room to stumble. Though a moody cover of Fleetwood Mac's "Gold Dust Woman" is a little awkward, his original "Lookin' for a Feeling" is sturdy, and the album-closing "The Wurlitzer Prize (I Don't Want to Get Over You)" is brilliant, possibly the best song here, even if the heart of the record – what the album is selling – is the four duets with Willie. One of these, of course, is the monster hit "Mammas Don't Let Your Babies Grow Up to Be Cowboys," with two others – "The Year 2003 Minus 25" and "Don't Cuss the Fiddle" – being laid-back, funny Kris Kristofferson songs that showcase Waylon & Willie's roguish humor and charm. The other, "Pick Up the Tempo," is one of Willie's classics, but it, like Nelson's three solo tracks, is a previously released Waylon recording stripped of his vocals and overdubbed by Nelson. This isn't a crippling problem – the songs are good, as are the performances and the singing, so they're modestly enjoyable – but they do sound a little distant, and it makes the entire album sound cobbled together: not the deliberate compilation of The Outlaws, but significantly less than a real album from either Waylon or Willie or both of them. Instead, it sounds like a vehicle for them to keep riding their huge popularity. Since it was cut at a time they were making consistently enjoyable music, it's fun, but it could have been much, much more than it is.

Stephen Thomas Erlewine, Allmusic.com

×

Waylon Jennings - Original Album Classics (2008) 5CD Box Set

Close