Willie Nelson had completed eight frustrating, hit-and-miss years with RCA in 1972 when a chance meeting with a longtime fan, Atlantic's legendary vice-president/producer Jerry Wexler, who loved all things country, changed everything. With Atlantic opening a country division, Willie would become their flagship artist. The creative freedom afforded him there became the launching pad for everything that happened later. Even so, his two years at Atlantic tend to be critically overlooked amid the broader context of later classics such as Red Headed Stranger, Stardust and Always On My Mind.
In 1995, Rhino released A Classic And Unreleased Collection, a three-CD box set beginning with his first self-produced single from 1956, some early '60s Pamper Music demos, 18 Atlantic recordings (six outtakes and eleven 1974 live recordings from the Texas Opry House in Austin) and two unreleased 1980s post-Atlantic albums. This three-CD compendium assembles all the Atlantics, save his gospel album Troublemaker, recorded at his first Atlantic session but long owned by Sony BMG.
During one week in February 1973, Willie, working at Atlantic's Manhattan studios with a gaggle of Texas, Nashville and Manhattan musicians, among them longtime Willie (and Ray Price) pedal steel guitarist Jimmy Day and, from Nashville, Sammi Smith and a then-unknown Larry Gatlin, completed both Troublemaker and Shotgun Willie.
The latter demonstrated the essence of Willie's vision by seamlessly blending new and old. For him, that musical commonality was nothing new, but it helped him realize a greater goal: bridging a wide cultural gap between his older, conservative fans and younger Texas longhairs. The new included the title song, written during the sessions, as well as Leon Russell's "My Cricket And Me" and "A Song For You". The old ranged from Bob Wills' "Bubbles In My Beer" and "Stay All Night (Stay A Little Longer)" to Johnny Bush's "Whiskey River" and Willie's early '60s originals "Local Memory" and "Slow Down Old World".
Of the outtakes, the extended instrumental "Willie's After Hours" projects a certain hypnotic allure (until it begins to drone). Two vocal outtakes stand out: the magnificent, knowing "Save Your Tears" and Day's "I Drank Our Precious Love Away", neither of which appeared on the previous reissue.
At the time, Shotgun charted short of Willie's most popular RCA albums. Nonetheless, it left him musically and spiritually invigorated enough to forge ahead with Phases And Stages. A follow-up to his 1971 concept masterpiece Yesterday's Wine, he'd kicked the idea around a while, having recorded six Phases songs at his final two RCA sessions. The concept, chronicling marital dissolution from male and female vantage points, improved upon Jean Shepard's 1956 Songs Of A Love Affair, which did likewise from the female perspective.
An alternate Phases follows the released version, recorded with Willie's regular touring band including Mickey Raphael on harmonica. Despite extensive documentation (including Bill Bentley's competent though occasionally tangential essay), this session is mysterious, as no recording dates are provided. Despite that, the presence of former Nashville session guitar whiz Grady Martin, who joined Willie's band in 1980 and remained there until 1994, provides some clues. The June 1974 Texas Opry House recordings from the 1995 package (augmented by four never-released performances) remain a bracing chronicle of Willie at 41.
By September 1974, Atlantic, having fumbled the ball, shuttered their country division. A deeply frustrated Wexler released Nelson from his contract, freeing him to make a better deal with Columbia that again guaranteed creative control. From that came Red Headed Stranger, the fabulously successful 1975 concept album that opened the door to his now iconic stature. The repercussions of Willie's Atlantic era echo more than 30 years later.
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