Roots, Indeed

Southern Roots is definitely a desert island record. It's not just a collection of tunes but a statement. Dissolution, lust, forgiveness are on these recordings produced by the GREAT Huey Meaux with a supporting cast including Carl Perkins, most of the MGS and others. What they shoulda done is released this with the outtakes like Bear Family did with the box set back in the day. You get all the drunken chatter and insults, proclamations, threats and some interesting tunage as well.

Wow, how can you live without these recordings????

I could not understand my life without having these recordings in my heart and my mind. JLL did some of his greatest rock and roll in the mid 1970s when, by and large, no one was looking for rock and roll from middle-aged white Southerners. There is not a nostalgic cut on the two albums that combined here on one precious CD. Jerry is simply rocking out here in a way no one else ever has or ever will, bar none.

Just the first cut, the meat man--with a MayTag (C) tongue--is worth the price. Jerry even gets into the spirit of the antiwar, antisystem radicalization of the day by proclaiming himself a "Revolutionary Man." And there are few tunes that rock the way Jerry's just a little bit does.

Oh my goodness, I may leave work early today just to hear this stuff.

The later cuts are from another album where Jerry is beginning to head in the direction of going country where he would make some of his or anyone else's best recordings in the mid 1970s. Who else could do a song like "I can still hear the music in the restroom" with class, taste, believablity, and take your right there, and still swing solid.

Again, you need this CD. I need it. The world needs it!!!