Customer Reviews

Lone Star Beer/for All My Cowb

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Are you a fan of western swing? How 'bout cowboys and rodeo? If you can answer yes to either of these, and you like western music then you owe it to yourself to check this out. Red, quite simply, puts out the best. I've been following him since the late 70's, used to follow him to honky-tonks and rodeos, from Sayre, Oklahoma to the NFR. Had both on albums but just now found these on CD. Try this CD and see if it's not the best combo of western-swing and cowboy music you've ever heard. Red, if you see this, wishing you all the best and a great big thank you for your music.

If you appreciate Red Steagall you will appreciate this cd. It has some of his best Texas Swing music and his very best Rodeo Songs. After thousands of miles my tape of "All My Cowboy Friends" finally wore out and I thought I would never find another copy. Now I have another copy to help me get down the road again. Steagall's music is not for everyone but if you like his music this cd is what your looking for.

The first 10 cuts -- the ones that comprise the wonderful 1976album Lone Star Beer and Bob Wills Music -- are as close to perfectionas honkytonk swing gets. As I hear it again after a long separation, the album sounds as good as it did when I bought the LP version nearly a quarter-century ago and spent the next few years playing it down to the grooves. "Neons and Nylons" holds its own against any country song about drinkin', dancin', and chasin' women -- an inexplicably neglected masterpiece of hillbilly art and a surprisingly subtle evocation of both good times and melancholy reflection. "Under the X in Texas" and "Alexis from Texas" swing jauntily, and "Whatever Made Me Think" is as powerful a catch-in-the-throat country weeper as you're ever going to hear. With its brilliantly imagined and executed stripped-down sound, the album wastes not a note or a lick, and it lays end to end one magnificent song after another, reminding the listener just how good country music can be when placed in the right hands. Perhaps inevitably, Red Steagall's follow-up, included here (the last 11 cuts), is something of a letdown, a decent though hardly outstanding collection of cowboy (mostly rodeo) songs, none bad but none especially memorable; certainly none gets close to the standards Ian Tyson set long ago in his own rodeo tales, notably "Someday Soon" and "Old Cheyenne." Steagall's cover of "My Adobe Hacienda" is just plain uninspired; on the other hand, he proves that you can't go wrong with the venerable Western folk ballad "Little Joe the Wrangler." His "My America," though no "This Land Is Your Land," is better than its title would lead you to believe. Steagall's heart may be on the Western plains, but his soul is in the honkytonk.

I got the original album "Lone Star Beer.." back in '76, when I had just discovered western swing and hard core country as a young teenager. Unlike most albums, this one has never gathered any dust on the shelf. It is still on the turntable at least every three months or so, after nearly 25 years. Naturally, it is worn out by now, so I am getting the CD pronto. You should do the same. This is as real and heartfelt as it gets!

This CD is worth every penny! I have been waiting for years for Lone Star.....to be released on CD. Every song on this album is a winner, you WILL NOT be disappointed.

Two of the very best albums of Western Swing & Honky Tonk, recorded in the mid 1970s with the cream of Nashville's sessionmen. I've worn out my cassette copies of each, and am glad Koch has reissued them together. If you like early Chris Ledoux or Ian Tyson's cowboy albums, this cd is for you.