First my wife told me what she wanted for Christmas. Then she said she went ahead and bought it. So I was free to buy myself whatever I wanted on her behalf. I took the opportunity to finally pick up a turntable.
The trick, though, isn’t the turntable. It is the record collection.
Vinyl is expensive. It is the record expense, not the turntable expense, that kept me from buying a turntable too long. So I need to be strategic in my album choice. Basically, I have five buckets of vinyl to fill:
- Outlaw country canonical albums
- Southern rock canonical albums
- Personal canon of my favorite indie country albums
- Merle Haggard albums
- Assorted blues/jazz albums for the vibe
I am going to (eventually) buy up every Merle Haggard album I can find (with an emphasis on actual albums, not greatest hits collections). And obviously my personal canon is subjective, but I welcome suggestions as to just what are the canonical outlaw country and Southern rock albums.
I did go ahead and grabbed three albums so I could dive right in on Christmas Day:
- The Dirty South by Drive By Truckers
- Pronounced ‘Lĕh-‘nérd ‘Skin-‘nérd: Live from Jacksonville at the Florida Theatre by Lynyrd Skynyrd
- Live From the Ryman by Jason Isbell and the 400 Unit
You can find every video featured in 2021 for Music Monday here.
Follow Hillbilly Highways on Facebook.
Hillbilly Highways 