Reflections / Should I Come Home

This two-fer, compiling Gene Watson's Reflections (1978) and Should I Come Home (1979), is the third entry in Hux Records' reissue project form his Capitol period. 2002 saw the debut CD release of Love in the Hot Afternoon and Paper Rosie, and in 2005 they issued Because You Believed in Me, and Beautiful Country. Watson was a serious chart contender throughout the middle and late '70s (he scored 17 charting singles in five years) and well into the '80s — he even scored a couple of chart hits in the '90s. These last two recordings from the Capitol years are rooted at the seam split between classic country ballads, honky tonk, and the emerging urban cowboy sound without losing any of their hard-earned Nashville cred. Watson is a singer who can swagger and croon with acuity and authenticity. His songs contain worlds of emotion, both simple and complex. Check the contrast between the beautiful ballad "One Sided Conversation" and the rocked-up two-stepper "Take Off Them Shoes," the first two tracks on Reflections. It's in the grain of Watson's voice that we hear the man faced with the daunting task of everyday life, and his willingness to surrender what is necessary and fight for what is good and true — and all this in a voice that is as smooth as blended bourbon. It's true that Watson is best known for his ballads, and that reputation is well earned. But it's in the complexity of the material he relates that his true gifts as a singer are revealed to the listener. Check "Pick the Wildwood Flower," where you can hear the restless road spirit of Merle Haggard calling out over the wilderness, or the languid, midtempo cheating ballad "I Know What It's Like in Her Arms," and you can hear the sound of a roaming spirit, trying to find its way home. On the latter album in this set, wooly, funky, honky tonk like "That Evil Child," (with a smoking Rhodes piano) juxtaposes with the lonely barroom ballad bandstander "The Heart of a Clown," and the painful weeper "I Can't Help It (If I'm Still in Love with You.)" All of it adds up to a killer CD, one that underscores the truth in Hux's commitment to the Watson legacy: that this man is one of the greatest singers country music has ever produced.