''Music Man'' is a studio album by American

country music Country (also called country and western) is a popular music, music genre originating in the southern regions of the United States, both the American South and American southwest, the Southwest. First produced in the 1920s, country music is p ...

artist

Waylon Jennings Waylon Arnold Jennings (June 15, 1937 – February 13, 2002) was an American singer, songwriter, musician, and actor. He is considered one of the pioneers of the Outlaw country, outlaw movement in country music. Jennings started playing ...

, released in 1980 on

RCA Victor RCA Records is an American record label owned by Sony Music Entertainment, a subsidiary of Sony Group Corporation. It is one of Sony Music's four flagship labels, alongside Columbia Records (its former longtime rival), Arista Records and Epic ...

Recording and composition

The new decade brought another #1 album for Jennings, his fifth since 1976. Produced by the singer and Waylon's drummer Richie Albright, the mood is lighter than it had been on Jennings' previous release, the ballad-heavy '' What Goes Around Comes Around''. Jennings later said of both records, "Virtually identical in cover look and personnel, the two albums revolved around his resolute bass drum, while the guitars swirled, traded licks, and I rode the rhythm section like a palomino." It contains the popular " Theme from "The Dukes of Hazzard" (Good Ol' Boys)", which became Jennings' tenth solo #1 hit. As the narrator for the 1975 movie '' Moonrunners'', Jennings was tapped to serve in the same capacity for ''The Dukes of Hazzard'' which premiered on

CBS CBS Broadcasting Inc., commonly shortened to CBS (an abbreviation of its original name, Columbia Broadcasting System), is an American commercial broadcast television and radio network serving as the flagship property of the CBS Entertainme ...

in 1979 and was based on ''Moonrunners''. Jennings wrote the theme song for the show and recorded two versions: the television theme version and a slightly different version made commercially available on both single and album which received radio airplay. The television show version features a

banjo The banjo is a stringed instrument with a thin membrane stretched over a frame or cavity to form a resonator. The membrane is typically circular, and in modern forms is usually made of plastic, where early membranes were made of animal skin. ...

which the commercially available version does not, as well as a bridge which follows the first verse and chorus. Following the second chorus, Jennings makes a tongue-in-cheek reference to his faceless appearance in the credits by singing, "I'm a good ol' boy, you know my mama loves me, but she don't understand why they keep showing my hands and not my face on TV!", a statement referring to the opening shot in the television theme version where Jennings is only shown below the neck playing guitar. As Andrew Dansby of ''

Rolling Stone ''Rolling Stone'' is an American monthly magazine that focuses on music, politics, and popular culture. It was founded in San Francisco, California, in 1967 by Jann Wenner and the music critic Ralph J. Gleason. The magazine was first known fo ...

'' wryly noted in 2002, "In 1980, another generation discovered Jennings, albeit only a third of him." The song was certified double-platinum by the

Recording Industry Association of America The Recording Industry Association of America (RIAA) is a trade organization that represents the music recording industry in the United States. Its members consist of record labels and distributors that the RIAA says "create, manufacture, and/o ...

with over 2 million in sales.riaa.com
Jennings' other songwriting contribution, "It's Alright," is a simultaneous tribute to

Oklahoma Oklahoma ( ; Choctaw language, Choctaw: , ) is a landlocked U.S. state, state in the South Central United States, South Central region of the United States. It borders Texas to the south and west, Kansas to the north, Missouri to the northea ...

rocker J.J. Cale (''Music Man'' opens with a cover of Cale's song " Clyde") and

George Jones George Glenn Jones (September 12, 1931 – April 26, 2013) was an American Country music, country musician, singer, and songwriter. He achieved international fame for a long list of hit records, and is well known for his distinctive voice an ...

(''"If we could all sing like we wanted to, we'd all sound like George Jones"''). Waylon also mentions his wife

Jessi Colter Mirriam Johnson (born May 25, 1943), known professionally as Jessi Colter, is an American country singer who is best known for her collaborations with her second husband, country musician Waylon Jennings, and for her 1975 crossover hit " I'm Not ...

on "It's Alright" and recorded her song "Storms Never Last" for the LP, which they would reprise on their duet album '' Leather and Lace''. In the liner notes to ''The Essential Waylon Jennings'', Wade Jessen quotes the singer: "Jessi had this song and she threw it away. Like

Lash Larue Alfred "Lash" LaRue (June 15, 1917 – May 21, 1996) was a Western motion picture star of the 1940s and 1950s. Early life and education Born Alfred LaRue in Gretna, Louisiana in 1917, he was reared in various towns throughout Louisiana, ...

I brought it back. She said, 'I have a silly song for you.' There was not a rhyming line it, every line in the song standing on its own. At first the chorus went, 'Storms never last/Do they, Waylon?' She wrote it for me." The singles "Clyde" and "Storms Never Last" reached #7 and #17 respectively. Jennings relied on covers heavily for ''Music Man'', which may have been an indication of his dampened creativity due to years of touring, recording, and drug abuse. In addition to Cale, he also covers songs by

Kenny Rogers Kenneth Ray Rogers (born Kenneth Donald Rogers) (August 21, 1938 – March 20, 2020) was an American singer and songwriter. He was inducted into the Country Music Hall of Fame and Museum, Country Music Hall of Fame in 2013. Rogers was particul ...

, whose 1979 album ''

Kenny Kenny is a surname, a given name, and a diminutive of several different given names. In Ireland, the surname is an Anglicisation of the Irish ''Ó Cionnaith'', also spelt ''Ó Cionnaoith'' and ''Ó Cionaodha'', meaning "descendant of Cionnaith". ...

'' had kept Waylon's previous album out of the #1 spot, and

Jimmy Buffett James William Buffett (December 25, 1946 – September 1, 2023) was an American singer-songwriter, author, and businessman. He was known for his tropical rock sound and persona, which often portrayed a lifestyle described as "island escapis ...

. One of Jennings most unexpected recordings is his surprisingly credible version of

Steely Dan Steely Dan is an American rock band formed in Annandale-on-Hudson, New York, in 1971 by Walter Becker (guitars, bass, backing vocals) and Donald Fagen (keyboards, lead vocals). Originally having a traditional band lineup, Becker and Fagen cho ...

's 1972 song " Do It Again", although for some purists his propensity for remaking songs well outside the realms of country music was in danger of becoming schtick. Jennings was far more at home on the

Ernest Tubb Ernest Dale Tubb (February 9, 1914 – September 6, 1984), nicknamed the Texas Troubadour, was an American singer and songwriter and one of the pioneers of country music. His biggest career hit song, "Walking the Floor Over You" (1941), marked ...

classic "Waltz Across Texas" and the

Harlan Howard Harlan Perry Howard (September 8, 1927 – March 3, 2002) was an American songwriter, principally in country music. In a career spanning six decades, Howard is credited with writing more than 4,000 songs, over 100 of which reached country mus ...

's lascivious "Nashville Wimmen."

Jerry Reed Jerry Reed Hubbard (March 20, 1937 – September 1, 2008), known professionally as Jerry Reed, was an American country singer, guitarist, composer, songwriter and actor who appeared in more than a dozen films. His signature songs included " Gui ...

Johnny Rodriguez Juan Raoul Davis "Johnny" Rodriguez (December 10, 1951 – May 9, 2025) was an American country music singer from Texas. In the 1970s and 1980s, Rodriguez was one of country music's most successful male artists, recording a string of hit songs, ...

, and

Randy Scruggs Randy Lynn Scruggs (August 3, 1953 – April 17, 2018) was an American music producer, songwriter and guitarist. He had his first recording at the age of 13. He won four Grammy Awards and was named Musician of the Year at the Country Music ...

play on the album.

Critical reception

AllMusic AllMusic (previously known as All-Music Guide and AMG) is an American online database, online music database. It catalogs more than three million album entries and 30 million tracks, as well as information on Musical artist, musicians and Mus ...

: "...in retrospect it's easy to hear that Waylon was on some unsteady ground around this time. Not that this is a bad record, but it does show signs that he was relying a little too much on polish and that his ear for material is slightly off...It's an album that, once again, doesn't quite add up to the sound of its parts, and in retrospect, those parts do seem to point toward his commercial and artistic collapse a few years away, but even with these flaws, Music Man is a pretty entertaining latter-day Waylon album."

Track listing

Personnel

*Waylon Jennings - vocals, guitar,

dobro Dobro () is an American brand of resonator guitars owned by Gibson and manufactured by its subsidiary Epiphone. The term "dobro" is also used as a generic term for any wood-bodied, single-cone resonator guitar. The Dobro was originally a gui ...

*Richie Albright - drums, percussion *

Ralph Mooney Ralph Mooney (September 16, 1928 – March 20, 2011) was an American steel guitar player and songwriter, he was inducted into the Steel Guitar Hall of Fame in 1983. He was the original steel guitarist in Merle Haggard's band, the Strangers and ...

steel guitar A steel guitar () is any guitar played while moving a steel bar or similar hard object against plucked strings. The bar itself is called a "steel" and is the source of the name "steel guitar". The instrument differs from a conventional guitar i ...

, dobro *Duke Goff - bass *Jerry Bridges - bass *Billy Ray Reynolds - guitar *

- guitar *

- guitar *Gordon Payne - guitar, harmonica *

- guitar *Rance Wasson - guitar *Carter Robertson - backing vocals *Barney Robertson - keyboards *Charles Cochrane - keyboards *Bill Graham -

fiddle A fiddle is a Bow (music), bowed String instrument, string musical instrument, most often a violin or a bass. It is a colloquial term for the violin, used by players in all genres, including European classical music, classical music. Althou ...

Recording and composition

Critical reception

Track listing

Personnel

Charts

Weekly charts

Year-end charts

Certifications

References