Description
Steve Earle was nineteen and had just hitchhiked from San Antonio to Nashville in 1974. Back then if you wanted to be where the best songwriters were you had to be in there. Guy Clark had moved to Nashville and if you were from Texas, Guy Clark was king. A few years later, Steve would be playing bass guitar in Guy’s band and flying high on what would become an indelible friendship of like-minded musicians who bonded in a kinship of stories told through song.
Flash forward more than forty years to May 2016. Guy Clark had just succumbed to cancer after a long battle with lymphoma. Guy had lived with his disease and had continued to write songs until the day he died. He also painted, built instruments and owned a guitar shop in the Bay Area. According to Earle, “You hung around with him [Guy] and knew why they call what artists do disciplines. Because he was disciplined.”
The same can be said of Earle. In the fall of 2018, Steve and The Dukes went into House Of Blues studio in Nashville and recorded Guy in six days. “I wanted it to sound live…When you’ve got a catalog like Guy’s and you’re only doing sixteen tracks, you know each one is going to be strong.”
Earle and his current, perhaps best-ever Dukes lineup, take on these songs with a spirit of reverent glee and invention. The tunes are all over the place and so is the band, offering max energy on such disparate entries as the bluegrass rave-up “Sis Draper” and the talking blues memoir of “Texas 1947.” Earle’s raw vocal on the sweet, sad “That Old Time Feeling” is heartbreaking, sounding close enough to the grave as to be doing a duet with his late friend and mentor.
You can hear little hints of where Earle came from. The stark “Randall Knife” has the line “a better blade that was ever made was probably forged in Hell,” which wouldn’t be out of place in a Steve Earle original. Also hard to beat is “The Last Gunfighter,” a sardonic western saga to which Earle offers a bravura reading of the chorus: “the smell of the black powder smoke and the stand in the street at the turn of joke.”
But in the end Guy leads the listener back to its beginning, namely Guy Clark, which is what any good “tribute” should do. Guy is a saga of friendship, its ups and downs, what endures. We are lucky that Earle remembers and honors these things, because like old friends, Guy is a diamond.
Label: New West Records – NW5296
Format: 2 × Vinyl, LP, Album, Limited Edition, Reissue, Or+Red Swirl
Country: US
Released: 2021
Genre: Rock, Folk, World, & Country
Style: Country, Country Rock, Folk
Guy (Vinyl, LP, Album, Limited Edition, Reissue)
Tracklist
A1 Dublin Blues
Songwriter – Guy Clark 3:49
A2 L.A. Freeway
Songwriter – Guy Clark 4:06
A3 Texas 1947
Songwriter – Guy Clark 3:15
A4 Desperados Waiting For A Train
Songwriter – Guy Clark 4:35
B1 Rita Ballou
Songwriter – Guy Clark 3:13
B2 The Ballad Of Laverne And Captain Flint
Songwriter – Guy Clark 4:06
B3 The Randall Knife
Songwriter – Guy Clark 4:01
B4 Anyhow I Love You
Songwriter – Guy Clark 3:06
C1 That Old Time Feeling
Songwriter – Guy Clark 5:02
C2 Heartbroke
Songwriter – Guy Clark 2:45
C3 The Last Gunfighter Ballad
Songwriter – Guy Clark 3:22
C4 Out In The Parking Lot
Songwriter – Guy Clark, James Scott (27) 2:40
D1 She Ain’t Going Nowhere
Songwriter – Guy Clark 3:50
D2 Sis Draper
Songwriter – Guy Clark, Shawn Camp 3:27
D3 New Cut Road
Songwriter – Guy Clark 4:10
D4 Old Friends
Songwriter – Guy Clark, Richard Dobson, Susanna Clark 4:57
Companies, etc.
Phonographic Copyright (p) – New West Records, LLC
Copyright (c) – New West Records, LLC
Copyright (c) – Steve Earle
Published By – EMI April Music Inc.
Published By – GSC Music
Published By – World Song Publishing Inc.
Published By – Royal Oak Music
Published By – Chuck Wagon Gourmet Music
Published By – Sony/ATV Harmony
Published By – International Dog Music
Published By – Travelin’ Arkansawyer Music
Published By – Salty Songs
Recorded At – House of Blues Studios, Nashville, TN
Recorded At – Arlyn Studios
Mixed At – Room & Board Recording
Mastered At – Room & Board Recording
Lacquer Cut At – Welcome To 1979
Designed At – Man Alive Creative
Credits
A&R – Kim Buie
Acoustic Guitar – Shawn Camp (tracks: D2, D3)
Acoustic Guitar, Vocals – Gary Nicholson (tracks: D4), Verlon Thompson (tracks: D4)
Art Direction, Design, Layout – Tom Bejgrowicz
Bass [The Dukes] – Kelley Looney
Booking [European] – Asgard LTD, Paul Fenn
Booking [North America] – Lance Roberts (5), UTA
Cover [Art] – Tony Fitzpatrick (2)
Cover [Back Cover Art] – Terry Allen
Crew [Dukes] – Brian Denny, Kevin Varnado, Reggie Winston, Todd Burman, Tyler Porch
Dobro – Jim McGuire (tracks: D4)
Drums, Percussion [The Dukes] – Brad Pemberton
Fiddle, Mandolin, Tenor Guitar, Vocals [The Dukes] – Eleanor Whitmore
Guitar, Mandolin, Vocals – Steve Earle
Guitar, Vocals [The Dukes] – Chris Masterson
Harmonica – Mickey Raphael (tracks: D4)
Lacquer Cut By – Cameron Henry (2)
Legal – Carroll, Guido & Groffman, Rosemary Carroll
Liner Notes – Steve Earle
Management – Danny Goldberg, Gold Mountain Entertainment, Jesse Bauer
Management [Business] – Butch Gage, Cal Financial Group, Dan Goscombe
Mandolin, Vocals – Shawn Camp (tracks: D4)
Mastered By – Ray Kennedy
Mixed By – Ray Kennedy
Pedal Steel Guitar, Vocals [The Dukes] – Ricky Ray Jackson
Photography By [Film Stills] – Jim Szalapski
Photography By [Guy Clark] – Paul Whitfield
Photography By [Hardly Strictly Bluegrass Festival] – Mike Melnyck
Photography By [Steve Earle + Dukes] – Tom Bejgrowicz
Producer – Steve Earle (tracks: A1 to C2, C4 to D4), The Twang Trust* (tracks: C3)
Public Relations [North American Publicity] – Brady Brock
Public Relations [UK Publicity] – Claire Horton
Public Relations [UK Radio & TV] – Richard Wootton
Recorded By – Ray Kennedy (2)
Recorded By [Additional] – Jacob Sciba (tracks: D4)
Recorded By [Assisted] – Joseph Holguin (tracks: D4), Lance Allen (2)
Vocals – Emmylou Harris (tracks: D4), Jerry Jeff Walker (tracks: D4), Jo Harvey Allen (tracks: D4), Rodney Crowell (tracks: D4), Terry Allen (tracks: D4)
Notes
Includes a 4 page insert containing photographs, liner notes, and credits.
Recorded at House of Blues in Nashville, TN.
Mixed and mastered at Room & Board Studio in Nashville, TN.
Additional recording on “Old Friends” at Arlyn Studios in Austin, TX.
Vinyl cut at Welcome To 1979 in Nashville, TN.
© & ℗ 2019 New West Records, LLC
Tracks A1, B3 published by EMI April Music Inc. / GSC Music (ASCAP)
Tracks A2 to B2, B4, C2, C3, D1, D3 published by World Song Publishing Inc. (ASCAP)
Track C1 published by World Song Publishing Inc. / Royal Oak Music (ASCAP)
Track C4 published by EMI April Music Inc. / GSC Music / Chuck Wagon Gourmet Music / Sony ATV Harmony (ASCAP) © 2001 Steve Earle appears on This One’s For Him: A Tribute To Guy Clark
Track D2 published by EMI April Music Inc. / International Dog Music (BMI) / Travelin Arkansawyer Music (BMI)
Track D4 published by EMI April Music Inc. / Salty Songs (BMI)
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