Lee Clayton - Lee Clayton (1973)

Something about the hard drinking, hard times, and heartbreak of classic country just sounds better when it's coming from a relative unknown artist, doesn't it? It's just so easy to picture Clayton hitting the bar after playing a phenomenal set at a sparsely attended honkey tonk, knocking back whiskey, smoking Lucky Strikes, and getting wistful about the latest woman to have passed through his life the same way he passes through town after town. Essentially, I'm imagining his life to very closely resemble the plot of Crazy Heart.

This is a man whose song, "Ladies Love Outlaws", a hit for Waylon Jennings, was at least partially responsible for the term "outlaw country." Every song on his early albums is an absolute gem, and the fact that he never got famous is as heartbreaking as the words to "Bottles of Booze". His second album, Border Affair, is possibly even better than this one, in that some of its songs add Thin Lizzy-style twin guitar leads to the mix, but since it's already readily available at the Rockasteria blog, I'll contribute this nevertheless excellent record to the blogosphere.

Track listing:
1. Carnival Balloon
2. Bottles of Booze
3. Henry McCarty
4. New York City Suite 409
5. Mama, Spend the Night with Me
6. Red Dancing Dress
7. Danger
8. Lonesome Whiskey
9. Ladies Love Outlaws

Set me up, bartender, with as much fun as I can use