VA - Truckers, Kickers, Cowboy Angels: The Blissed-Out Birth of Country Rock, Volume 7 (1974-1975) (2015)

2-CD Digipak (6-plated) with comprehensive booklet, 43 tracks. Sales have been strong and critical response has been overwhelming to Volumes 1 through 5. Now the story concludes! The mix is as before: big hits and neglected classics that tell the story of a musical genre. Double CDs with generously full booklets with complete song-by-song notes, rare photos, and first-person accounts.

Volume 7 – 1974-1975: The leading edge of the country rock scene was shifting from Los Angeles to Austin. In March 1973, 'Crawdaddy' magazine highlighted the Austin for the first time. Pretty soon, everyone was catching on. In September, 'Billboard' devoted a full page to Austin, calling out Willie Nelson, Doug Sahm, Jerry Jeff Walker, and Billy Joe Shaver. The original standard-bearers of Country Rock, the Byrds and the Flying Burrito Brothers, had lost their way, but their guru, Gram Parsons, made two of the finest LPs of any era. Parsons' work is the cornerstone of our last two volumes. But we detour to Austin to catch Doug Sahm, Jerry Jeff Walker, the Lost Gonzo Band, and Willie Nelson. We gather the best of the era's country rock from Nashville, New York, San Francisco, and all points in-between. Here are the era's greatest recordings and the stories behind them. We close with Gram Parsons' death and Emmylou Harris picking up pieces, carrying the music forward from Nashville. Country and Rock shouldn't have coexisted in the mid-to-late 1960s when the United States was so polarized and ROCK epitomized one cultural extreme just as COUNTRY epitomized the other. But the trippy, counter-culture edge that Gram Parsons, the Byrds, the Burritos, Commander Cody, Michael Nesmith, and the others brought to country music, made the unimaginable real. That's the story we've told. We followed Country Rock on a ten-year journey from 1966 to 1975. Since then, it has branched in many directions: Soft Rock, Outlaw country, Southern Rock, Alt-Country, Americana, and much else. But if you follow the tributaries back, you usually arrive at the music anthologized in this series.

Tracklist:

1.01. Gram Parsons and Emmylou Harris - Return of the Grievous Angel (4:24)
1.02. Gene Clark - Life's Greatest Fool (4:45)
1.03. New Riders of the Purple Sage - Crooked Judge (2:59)
1.04. The Flying Burrito Brothers - Building Fires (4:22)
1.05. Richard Betts - Long Time Gone (4:32)
1.06. J. J. Cale - Cajun Moon (2:13)
1.07. Hoyt Axton - When the Morning Comes (3:31)
1.08. Willie Nelson and Tracy Nelson - After the Fire Is Gone (3:04)
1.09. Waylon Jennings - Are You Sure Hank Done It This Way (2:56)
1.10. Hank Williams Jr. - Stoned at the Jukebox (2:46)
1.11. The Charlie Daniels Band - Willie Jones (3:14)
1.12. Muleskinner - Mule Skinner Blues (3:14)
1.13. Barefoot Jerry - Mother Nature's Way of Saying High (5:42)
1.14. Larry Jon Wilson - Ohoopee River Bottomland (3:42)
1.15. Guy Clark - L. A. Freeway (4:59)
1.16. Nitty Gritty Dirt Band - Ripplin' Waters (5:47)
1.17. Souther-Hillman-Furay Band - Border Town (3:53)
1.18. The Doobie Brothers - Tell Me What You Want (And I'll Give You What You Need) (3:51)
1.19. Billy Swan - I Can Help (4:01)
1.20. The Outlaws - There Goes Another Love Song (3:05)
1.21. Willie Nelson - Bloody Mary Morning (2:50)
1.22. Gram Parsons - Brass Buttons (3:27)

2.01. The Souther-Hillman-Furay Band - Trouble in Paradise (5:05)
2.02. The Outlaws - Knoxville Girl (3:31)
2.03. Gene Clark - From a Silver Phial (3:43)
2.04. Muleskinner - Runways of the Moon (4:21)
2.05. Gram Parsons and Emmylou Harris - In My Hour of Darkness (3:44)
2.06. The Flying Burrito Brothers - Sweet Desert Childhood (3:47)
2.07. Commander Cody and His Lost Planet Airmen - Southbound (2:20)
2.08. Kinky Friedman - Something's Wrong with the Beaver (2:49)
2.09. Barefoot Jerry - Slowin' Down (3:44)
2.10. Ozark Mountain Daredevils - E. E. Lawson (3:34)
2.11. Johnny Rivers - Wait a Minute (4:17)
2.12. Billy Swan - Lover Please (2:51)
2.13. Donnie Fritts - We Had It All (3:00)
2.14. The Lost Gonzo Band - Railroad Man (4:36)
2.15. Jesse Winchester - Mississippi, You're on My Mind (3:26)
2.16. Sir Doug and The Texas Tornados - Cowboy Peyton Place (3:38)
2.17. Guy Clark - Desperados Waiting for a Train (4:32)
2.18. Emmylou Harris - Boulder to Birmingham (3:33)
2.19. The Wright Brothers Overland Stage Company - Wild Wicked Woman of the West (4:56)
2.20. John Prine - Come Back to Us Barbara Lewis Hare Krishna Beauregard (3:19)
2.21. Willie Nelson - Blue Eyes Crying in the Rain (2:19)