There is good reason to assume Marty Stuart had more chart success than he actually has.
For starters, he is an icon. He is the greatest ambassador for country music this side of Vince Gill. His musical pedigree is almost without peer between his bluegrass, rockabilly, country rock, and classic country credentials. He joined bluegrass legend Lester Flatt’s band at age thirteen. He then played and toured with Johnny Cash. He is an instrumental virtuoso, an expert mandolin player and guitarist. He is a journalist and a photographer of note. He is married to Grand Ole Opry member, and Country Music Hall of Fame member, Connie Smith. He has produced late-career albums by Smith, Kathy Mattea, and Porter Wagoner. Marty Stuart is a preservationist and a significant collector of country music artifacts and history. As cool and edgy as he was when he was young, he and his Fabulous Superlatives are the hippest quartet going today.
Yet, despite all the impeccable company he keeps. his prodigious talent and brilliant tendencies, and his placing thirty singles on the Billboard Hot Country charts, Stuart has never run a single to the top as a solo artist.
As Bob Allen said in the January/February 1990 issue of Country Music, “…there are always a select few who seem to be held back not by their lack of talent but by their abundance of it – artists who are capable of growing in so many directions at once that the question of focus can become a difficult one.”
Enter Tony Brown to provide that focal point.
Brown co-produced Stuart’s classic 1990 MCA album Hillbilly Rock along with Richard Bennett. He was once again busy as a bee inside his MCA hive, cross-pollinating his showiest flowers coming into bloom in the late ’80s and early ’90s in Nashville.
And nobody was flashier than Marty Stuart with his rhinestone Nudie suits and long-haired swagger, a country punk dripping with honeyed passion, gritty purpose and genuine faith in the power of country music.
Even while chasing hit records and fully playing the Nashville game at the time.
Stuart co-wrote “When the Sun Goes Down” and the reverb-drenched “Since I Don’t Have You” with fellow young upstart Mark Collie.
He co-wrote “Don’t Leave Her Lonely Too Long” with Kostas.
Paul Kennerley, who wrote two songs for Kelly Willis’ Well Travelled Love, contributes three cuts on Hillbilly Rock- the title track, “Western Girls,” and “Easy to Love (Hard to Hold).”
Stuart includes a killer version of Joe Ely’s story-song “Me and Billy the Kid ” featuring Stuart’s spectacular and sparkling mandolin playing.
He even faithfully covers Johnny Cash’s 1955 debut single “Cry, Cry, Cry.”
Dropping his bucket into all those creative wells should have guaranteed he pull up at least one smash single in Music City in 1990, if not a string of them.
Turns out, “Hillbilly Rock” would peak at number eight on the charts and the second single “Western Girls” would barely break the top twenty.
Maybe Nashville didn’t like that Stuart didn’t even have a hat to cock; he most definitely wore his gun all wrong.
That gun was this entire album and his absolute artistic credibility. It was, as Bob Allen said, “…a powerful confident, and finely tuned musical statement.”
The lead single “Hillbilly Rock” was a historical statement song. It defined Marty Stuart and his brand of music while also documenting the history of the genre, still sounding greasy, fast, and pumpin,’ while dragging it forward for a new, young audience to experience for the first time.
The entire album was all energy and attitude. Stuart had come close to matching this vibe with his largely ignored eponymous 1986 Columbia debut. His 1982 Sugar Hill album Busy Bee Cafe leaned more heavily into acoustic instrumentation and his bluegrass influences.
In the liner notes to his later Richard Bennett and Tony Brown produced 1992 album This One’s Gonna Hurt You, Chicago Tribune journalist Jack Hurst wrote, “This gospel bluegrass country rock & roller has always exhibited profound consciousness of and respect for the history of country music…This ain’t just a young man love with country music history, dudes; it’s a richly diverse artists determined to take that history to the kids and make it turn them on.”
One of those kids who got turned on to Marty Stuart’s music was Gary Allan who included a cover of Stuart’s “ Don’t Leaver Her Lonely Too Long” from Hillbilly Rock on his 1998 sophomore Decca effort It Would Be You.
Hillbilly Rock is a musical compass pointing due country, keepin’ up the rhythm steady as a clock all these years later. It is an essential album from the early 90’s’ country canon that bristles with “gutsy, imaginative, guitar-gramed [sic] arrangements, and stormy sensuality” even as it is too often overshadowed by the bigger commercial successes of its era.
Eight years’ worth of excellent RFD-TV programming (The MARTY STUART SHOW) have convinced me that hit records were very much a secondary consideration for Marty Stuart. Making good music was always his focus and he seems to have stayed true to his vision throughout his career.
I always liked Marty Stuart’s swagger and ability to mix a rock edge with traditionalism. Even as a four-year-old, there was just something about “Tempted” and “Hillbilly Rock” that captivated me. I think he kind of lost his focus for a while on later albums, but compensated by pulling a bit more traditional after that (e.g., “Red Red Wine and Cheatin’ Songs”).
…There are a lot of insanely talented Martys in country music, aren’t there?
I’ve always thought the same thing you touch upon in your opening paragraph…that if you asked your average moderate country fan of the 1990s with a pretty good memory how many #1 hits they thought Marty Stuart had, they’d probably throw out a double-digit number. His legacy has loomed larger than his actual chart success for quite some time, but his stint as the lead historian on Ken Burns’ miniseries really increased his footprint. It’s astonishing that bangers like “Tempted” and “Little Things” never hit the top of the charts or even got particularly close. And it’s even more astonishing that radio was always so cool toward a guy who so perfectly captured the musical zeitgeist of the era while being skilled enough and smart enough to adapt to whatever changes mainstream country underwent. A baffling example of a rare talent done dirty by country radio.
I think one of the secret ingredients here is Richard Bennett. He didn’t get a lot of production credits, but when he did, he had this really distinctive touch. A lot of heavy beats, layered vocals, gallop beats, and mandolin everywhere. Another one of his tricks is breaking out the timpani, as you’d hear on “Tempted” from the next album.
Previous Flashback Friday entrant Marty Brown also had some help from Richard Bennett, as did personal favorite George Ducas. (“Lipstick Promises” just has amazing production.)
Will also shout-out Bennett for Kim Richey’s self-titled debut album, which I’d argue is one of the very best-produced albums in the genre’s history.
Oh man this album is great. I also loved his next record. My favorite album of his will always be Ghost Train and the Saturday night part of the Saturday night/Sunday morning record. I think both are perfect from start to finish. Just A+ albums. I’d argue he gets better and better
I was a casual fan of his in the nineties, but I had no idea how respected he’d become in the industry after his mainstream success. I like several of his hit songs, but I love his albums that came after the mainstream success. I was able to attend a concert of his several years ago and it was among the best shows I’ve been to!