Lubbock (On Everything)

About

A Texas country classic by an internationally recognized conceptual artist, <i>Lubbock (On Everything)</i> has shaped much of what’s come since the ambitious double album was released in 1979—both in and out of the Panhandle college town it’s dedicated to. Terry Allen is a Lubbock native, but he had already spent over a decade in California, studying art and pursuing anything but odes to his hometown. “I had a pretty sarcastic and negative attitude about Lubbock and Texas—on the surface, anyway,” as he put it later. “It wasn’t until I listened back to the songs I’d written that it dawned on me. The songs weren’t angry. They had a real care, <i>love</i> for this country and these people.” He wrote those songs ahead of his return to town, when he joined forces with fellow local and soon-to-be frequent collaborator Lloyd Maines—a Texas country legend and father of Natalie—to craft the expansive and intimate vision of Texas life. For all Allen’s erudition and artsy accolades, the album is straight country: catchy melodies, winking portraits of locals, and more than a little grit. There’s fiddle and pedal steel and jangling barroom piano, and Allen’s exaggerated twang riding easily atop it all (how many other country singers have leaned into their accents to similar ends but for different reasons?). The album’s opener, dedicated to another Texas boy made good in the art world, is its best-known song. “Amarillo Highway (For Dave Hickey)” was covered most famously by Robert Earl Keen, but never really topped in its original, over-the-top, pan-handlin’, man-handlin’ form. A dose of McMurtryian West Texan storytelling in rowdy song form, the track is rightfully canonical—as is the entire album, country with plenty of musical meat on the bone, and a shimmering, relentless originality. Immerse yourself in Terry Allen’s <i>Lubbock</i>, and emerge with a richer picture of every place you never thought much about.

via Apple Music

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