Customer Reviews

Got No Bread / Tryin' Like the Devil

5 star:		(3)
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The first of the two albums combined on this CD, "Got No Bread, No Milk and No Money" remains a favorite of mine some 30 years after I first heard it. Taking Talley's Oklahoma childhood as its theme it is by turns sad, boisterous and haunting. At the time it was issued I was working as a DJ and did everything I could to get people excited about Talley and the album, but he sort of fell between 1970s genres -- too serious in artistic intent for commercial country and too country for rock.

Happily Talley's website says that all of his early albums will soon be re-released.

I agree with the other reviewers that wish Talley was better known. This guy had the heart and soul of a great country/folk singer and performed these songs with passion. The first album, "Got No Money ..." was incredible, and the ones that followed that are also worth owning.

James Talley was country when country wasn't cool. These two albums, recorded in the mid-Seventies, run the gamut from Western swing to honky-tonk to folkish ballads that tug at you. When "W. Lee O'Daniel And The Light Crust Dough Boys" comes on, you feel like tapping your feet up a storm, while "Give My Love To Marie" and "Deep Country Blues" are as sad and timeless as life. Two wonderful albums that, hopefully, will see light again in the marketplace.