Outlaw country legend Blaze Foley — a guy who not only lived that life but died that death, shot by the son of his friend Concho January at age 39 — is the subject of a new tribute album. Sittin’ With Blaze, due out in August, features covers of the Austin singer-songwriter’s work by artists including Lucy Dacus, Lucinda Williams, Joshua Ray Walker, John Moreland and Lydia Loveless, and more.
The songs on the comp are early Foley tunes from his “tree house” days in Georgia, based on recordings released by Lost Art Records in 2010 under the title Sittin’ By The Road. Lost Art is introducing the album today with two tracks: a version of “If I Could Only Fly” by the spectral country band Phosphorescent and a spin through “Election Day” by Austin country-rockers Uncle Lucius.
“Driving a cab in Austin and trying to make it in music brought me a lot of Blaze stories,” said Kevin Galloway of Uncle Lucius. “Blaze is this big man with the biggest heart and nobody was below him. And he was a little eccentric as South Austin is or used to be. And that’s perfectly okay. That’s what makes him what he is.”
There’s also this from Matthew Houck of Phosphorescent: “I came to Blaze a while back. Like anybody who’s interested in songwriting you’re going to eventually find Lucinda, Townes Van Zandt, Blaze, Guy Clark. But Blaze was kind of a mystery to me. It wasn’t hard to capture the lonesomeness of ‘If I Could Only Fly.’ So really, it was just kind of, like, stay true to the song.”
Intriguingly, Phosphorescent’s “If I Could Only Fly” cover opens the album, and Williams’ take on the same song closes it. Hear the Phosphorescent and Uncle Lucius tracks and check out the tracklist below.
TRACKLIST:
01 Phosphorescent – “If I Could Only Fly”
02 Willie Watson – “Big Cheeseburgers & Good French Fries”
03 Lucy Dacus – “Clay Pigeons”
04 Cactus Lee – “Sittin’ By The Road”
05 Dylan Earl – “Slow Boat To China”
06 Uncle Lucius – “Election Day”
07 Riley Downing – “Let Me Ride In Your Big Cadillac”
08 Joshua Ray Walker – “Cold, Cold World”
09 Twain – “The Way You Smile”
10 Angela Autumn – “Rainbows & Ridges”
11 John R. Miller – “Fat Boy”
12 John Moreland – “Faded Love and Memories”
13 Lucinda Williams – “If I Could Only Fly”
Sittin’ With Blaze is out 8/7 on Lost Art Records.
‘ The preceding article may include information circulated by third parties ’
‘ Some details of this article were extracted from the following source stereogum.com ’
