Heartaches by the number (Dwight Yoakam) (LP 816 - 817)

Dwight Yoakam  Guitars, Cadillacs, etc. etc. (Vinyl, Reprise Records, 1986) ****  

Dwight Yoakam  Hillbilly Deluxe (Vinyl, Reprise Records, 1987) **** 

Genre: Country

Places I remember: Marbecks Records

Fab, and all the other pimply hyperboles: Honky Tonk Man. It was hearing this while working at Marbecks in the mid eighties that grabbed my attention. 

Gear costume: Guitars, Cadillacs

Active compensatory factors: I was holding off with the DY CDs, but now that I'm back in the vinyl collection I can kick off my Dwight Yoakam collection with his first two albums.

Guitars etc is his debut, a debut that builds on a previous 12 inch EP by adding four tracks - including a duet with Maria Mckee and the two tracks I've featured above. Magic additions!

I kind of think of Guitars...as raw country Dwight and Hillbilly Deluxe as smoother country Dwight. 

The back cover to Guitars (on the right) has him in the same basic clothes as on Hillbilly but that album adds designer rips to the jeans, a fancier shirt and a few more colourful embellishments to the jacket. All very appropriate to the music inside.

I like both looks, and both albums. Sometimes a voice and sound just grabs me. Dwight came along at the right time and did just that with these two albums.

Where do they all belong? No more Dwight on vinyl but a lot more to come on CD.