Customer Reviews

Hank Williams, Jr.'s Greatest Hits, Vol.1

5 star:		(30)
4 star:		(2)
3 star:		(2)
2 star:		(1)
1 star:		(1)

 

 

Hank Williams Jr. opened my mind and taught me to appreciate Country music. He mixes the perfect blend of Southern Rock and Country into his songs, creating music that even folks who dislike country music can learn to love; but make no mistake, it's without question classic Country music, and dang good music at that. This CD is a list of hits from 1979-1981, and if you're new to Hank's music, it's a good place to start getting acquainted with him.

What I love about Hank is that he shamelessly let's you know that he's a country boy and that he's proud of it. He's a real maverick and blazes his own trail instead of following country music trends. Hank does his thing and makes no apologies for it. If for no other reason, I personally would listen to his music for that reason alone.

Some of my favorites on this CD are the incomparable good-time bad-boy songs, "Family Tradition," "Whiskey Bent and Hell Bound," and "Women I've Never Had." If you've never had a good time drinkin' with Hank in the speakers, you're missin' out and need to toss back a few with the music blaring! Then there's one of the proud anthems for country folks all around America, "A Country Boy Can Survive," which is a favorite around my hillbilly-in-laws' house. Then there's the sober, "All My Rowdy Friends (Have Settled Down)," which is still a fun song to listen to even though all his rowdy friends have settled and "rowdy'd on down."

How can anyone not like Bocephus? He's plain spoken and sings his songs like he's just there to have a good time. Hey, anyone who sings a song that proclaims, "He likes happy and don't like sad," is worth listening to in my book; and any guy who sings songs about a ramblin' man, while askin' for a cold one in his hand is my kind of guy.

Don't stop to think it over, just put yourself in his position. Buy this CD, and make it a family tradition! It's a classic and worth every penny. Yee-Haw!!!!

There is nothing quite like stretching out in the bed of your pickup truck, grabbing a bottle of Jack Daniels, and playing this Hank Willimas Jr. Album. It seems as though you only have to hear it once to know it by heart. When it comes to country music, Hank Willimas Jr. doesn't screw around, and this is his finest work.Jared McKinney, Cairo Missouri

Even though trendy folks like Gretchen Wilson and Big And Rich are abusively gripping to his coattails, you have to remember that Hank, Jr. wasn't always the popular kid on the Nashville schoolbus. It took them years to recognize him as a true performer who stood on his own. Perhaps it was having to deal with the shadow of his father, or just that Nashville didn't want him to be a popular act, Bocephus never received his due until he was well into his career.

Hank, Jr. remedied the problem of being the outcast in Nashville by doing what so many artists can't do: be himself. Sure, he's loud, a little too honest, and just a flat-out hellraiser, but that's what folks like to hear. That's what has staying power.

This disc, which features Bocephus' biggest hits from the late 70's/early 80's, is loaded with enough attitude to shake up even the biggest poser in Nashville. Things open up with "Family Tradition," the song that is a legend unto itself in bars and honky-tonks across the USA. Next we have "Whiskey Bent and Hell Bound," "Women I've Never Had," and seven more instantly recognizable hits. My personal favorites include "Texas Women"(maybe 'cause I married one), and "Dixie On My Mind."

The biggest song on this disc has to be "A Country Boy Can Survive." It's the song that has spawned countless arguments over what would happen if the world fell apart tomorrow. It has empowered the good, bad, and ugly of the rural world. It makes city boys quiver in their metrosexual underpants. In short, it is one of the most popular songs ever put out there. It's influence is still felt today in acts like Montgomery Gentry and even Kid Rock.

In closing, buy this disc if you want real rebel country. Folks who like music by artists like Waylon Jennings will probably like this. Also, youngsters who enjoy Kid Rock need to check this out since without Hank, Kid Rock might have turned out to be another Vanilla Ice.

Give Bocephus his due, he's an integral part of the Country/Southern rock genre.

I have met a few people in Alabama that know Hank and used to hang out with him. Back then, he didn't have a record deal and played in on an old farm for free, just to get people to listen. No fluff there. He would sit out on the porch and just play with the people that showed up. He got so popular, that they built a set of bleachers for people to sit on. That is the Hank that is the real deal. So, he is singing about stuff he knows. This CD puts together some of his best compilations.

If you were a male growing up in the rural south in the Eighties this album and these songs gave voice to you opinions perfectly.Bocephus does'nt give a da-- about what anyone thinks in these songs and for many that is just fine."A Country Boy can Survive" is simply the finest anthem of this time in existence .A typical Chicagoan will be baffled by this album however I do not think Hank meant it for them anyway.

This is a greatest hits package, but it's also the best country album of all time. Hank Jr. is a true legend, and new country artists could learn a thing or two from him. These songs put new country "hits" to shame!! Keep rockin', Bocephus!

This is a great album! Hank just says it how it is. Anyone that is a country music fan at all needs this album. Hank rings through the hills here in West Virginia. He can sing Hank Sr.'s Kaw-Liga like noone else.

This album makes me fish better, drink whiskey better, pick up truck stop hillbilly waitresses better, spit better, four wheel drive better, honky tonk better, raise cowboy hell better, and love them southern trailer park ladies better... Cuz we can skin a buck, we can run a trot line and a countryboy can survive, country folks can survive. I'm gonna let out a Honky Tonk scream now.....Yeaowwww! Hard to believe I'm a native of India. Long live Bocephus.

This CD may not be for everybody; yet, pretty damn close. Fell in love with an American Dream, then All My Rowdy Friends. Still enjoy getting drunk and getting loud(at 54), amazing how many people look down at their noses at rowdiness anymore. Being an outdoor person, Country Boy Can Survive hits home. With the status of life in America, one may want to take lessons from a Country Boy. All songs are worth listening to !! Being a heavy metal/classic rock bass player, I was shocked at how this CD grew on me. One of my favorites. Hell; I am even thinking about looking into a steel guitar. A neighbor of 19 who is into rap, fell in love with this CD as well. For those that truly enjoy great music, for those that enjoy the TRUTH, for those that like to get loud; this CD is a MUST !!

Hank Williams, Jr.'s Greatest Hits (1982) is the one album no fan of "Bocephus" should be without. This is the best music from Hank's glory days in the late 1970s and early 1980s.

The album has been certified quintuple platinum, and one can only imagine how many times Whiskey Bent And Hell Bound has been played on juke boxes in the bars of America (I've contributed to that number a few times myself). Getting drunk is a major theme here, and Hank mentions Jim Beam, the Kentucky bourbon, in about half of the songs.

His dad, Hank Williams, Sr., is mentioned quite a bit here, too. Stepping out from beneath his dad's huge shadow had been something of an obsession for Hank, Jr. for most of his life. He was only three when his famous father died in the back seat of a Cadillac on the way to a New Year's Day show in 1953. After being taught to play guitar by Johnny Cash and piano by Jerry Lee Lewis, his mother (Audrey Williams) took him on the road to sing his dad's songs. After a near fatal fall from the side of a Montana mountain while climbing in 1975, and two years of recovery time, he and friend/mentor Waylon Jennings produced an album of Hank. Jr.'s songs called The New South. Done his own way, the album was a real turning point for Hank.

Hank Williams, Jr.'s Greatest Hits includes one of his dad's songs, Kaw-Liga, and Hank, Jr. gives it the full-on southern-rock treatment.

Waylon sings backing vocals on Texas Women, Hank's celebration of the Lone-Star beauties. A Country Boy Can Survive is a 4-wheelin'/huntin'and fishin'/outdoors partyin' anthem for country boys and girls everywhere.

Old Habits is a slow sad song about being left behind, and Dixie On My Mind is a southern-rocker about being stuck in The Big Apple and wanting to get back home.

Women I've Never Had is a Dixieland music celebration of all things Hank, and All My Rowdy Friends (Have Settled Down) is a famous-friends-name-dropping lament of the "no-one-left-to-party-with-blues". The autobiographical Family Tradition is Hank Williams, Jr.'s signature song.

So don't ask me, Hank, why do you drink?
Why do you roll smoke?
Why must you live out the songs that you wrote?
Stop and think it over
Try and put yourself in my unique position
If I get stoned and sing all night long
It's a Family Tradition!