If Hank Williams III's most recent album is his Moby Dick, a strenuous and difficult work about struggling with forces beyond his control, Heartworn Highways is more like Lake Wobegon Days, an intelligent, smart, and unpretentious album of people singing songs about living the way they want to, and what it means to them. Heaven and hell don't seem as close as friends, whiskey, and the velvet black of a Tennessee night, and all these geniuses love each other's company. It's just a little sad that all these artists who showed so much promise in 1976, who were kicking hard against the rigid conformity of Nashville's establishment, still remain marginal (if highly respected) figures in the scene they tried to topple. Still, whatever happened after, and whether or not their revolution succeeded and on what terms, Heartworn Highways is a fine chronicle of a great time in country music history.
"A sinister cabal of superior writers."
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