April 22, 2020 —– Chart #10

Hello Musical Friends,

Today we are going to the king of the Texas Troubadours himself, Mr. Guy Clark. Full disclosure, I first fell in love with this song listening to Jerry Jeff Walker, one of many artists to cover this song. But the tune belongs to Guy Clark and we need to give credit where it rightly belongs. Guy Clark was an American folk singer, musician, songwriter, recording artist, performer and luthier. He released more than twenty albums, and his songs have been recorded by other artists including Jerry Jeff Walker, Jimmy Buffett, Kathy Mattea, Lyle Lovett, Ricky Skaggs, Steve Wariner, Rodney Crowell, Steve Earle, Johnny Cash and Willie Nelson. He won the 2014 Grammy Award for Best Folk Album: My Favorite Picture of You.

“LA Freeway” is a great song and perfect for one person with a guitar and a voice. Clark was born in Monahans, Texas. His family moved to Rockport, Texas in 1954. After he graduated from high school in 1960, Guy spent almost a decade in Houston as part of the folk music revival in that city. He and his wife Susanna Clark eventually settled in Nashville, where he helped create the Americana music genre. His songs “L.A. Freeway” and “Desperados Waiting for a Train” helped launch his career and were covered by numerous performers. On his passing in 2016 the New York Times described him as “a king of the Texas troubadours”, declaring his body of work “as indelible as that of anyone working in the Americana idiom in the last decades of the 20th century”.

Here he is performing LA Freeway live on Austin City Limits: 

In case you have ever wondered “who is skinny Dennis”, he was a country musician in the Los Angeles area. He played the upright bass, most famously accompanying Nashville musician Guy Clark during Clark’s stay in Los Angeles. His nickname is in reference to his having Marfan syndrome; Sanchez stood at 6’11”, and weighed 135 lbs.

Keep Rockin’,

Stan