Additional information
Personnel: Tompall Glaser (vocals, guitar); Chris Gantry, Alfred F. Newell, Waylon Jennings (guitar); Johnny Gimble (fiddle); Fred Kyle Lehning, Bobby Emmons (piano, organ); Billy Swan (keyboards); Earl A. Harner, III (drums). Liner Note Authors: Colin Escott; Kinky Friedman; Tompall Glaser. Recording information: Glaser Sound Studios Inc., Nashville, TN; Hillbilly Central. Illustrators: Grahame Berney; Tompall Glaser. Photographers: Bob Shans; Marshall Fallwell; Tompall Glaser. "Hillbilly Central" was the name of the studio Tompall Glaser ran after the disbandment of the Glaser Brothers in the mid-'70s. It was the portion of the shared assets that he earned in the fall-out and he set up camp there, continuing to record for MGM, turning into something like the outlaw's outlaw: the ornery renegade who ran on the fringes, providing a clubhouse with his studio -- Waylon Jennings and Billy Joe Shaver cut albums there -- earning respect instead of hits. Bear Family chronicles this time on their two-part 2005 reissue dubbed Hillbilly Central, providing the first CD reissues of his classic LPs for MGM and Polydor. The first volume, My Notorious Youth, contains 1973's Charlie and 1974's Take the Singer with the Song, transitional albums that eased Tompall out of the Glasers and onto his own winding path -- quite literally so in the case of Charlie which, according to Colin Escott's excellent liner notes (over the course of the two discs, they untangle a knotty past and tell a complete history), was initially billed to the Glaser Brothers. It may have carried their name but it was surely a showcase for Tompall, particularly his gift for worn, weary introspection and storytelling. Unlike the MGM albums that followed, Charlie had a hefty dose of Tompall originals, highlighted by the title track -- an account of a no-good bastard who leaves his family in the lurch -- the story song "Big Jim Colson," "Bad Bad Cowboy," and its bad-time companion "An Ode to My Notorious Youth (Barred from Every Honky Tonk)." His covers of three Kinky Friedman songs -- including a terrific "Sold American" -- are pitch-perfect complements, as is a starkly melancholy medley of country gospel standards "I'll Fly Away" and "I Saw the Light," which don't contradict the carousing as much as underscore the sadness that runs beneath them. And that's the most compelling thing about Charlie: for outlaw country, it's surprisingly high and lonesome, a soundtrack for rumination, not parties. The same can't quite be said of its companion here, Take the Singer with the Song, although it shares the "I'll Fly Away" medley, albeit in a different, expanded form. Polydor released Take the Singer in the U.K. early in 1974 to capitalize on the momentum Tompall had from his Wembley festival performance. As it's caught between Charlie, his defacto debut even if it didn't bear his name, and his out-and-out first solo album Tompall Glaser Sings the Songs of Shel Silverstein, this is very much a transitio
![Tompall Glaser - My Notorious Youth: Hillbilly Central #1 [New CD] Reissue - Picture 1 of 1](https://i.ebayimg.com/images/g/lckAAOSwwDFfGpqO/s-l500.jpg)
![Tompall Glaser - My Notorious Youth: Hillbilly Central #1 [New CD] Reissue](https://ir.ebaystatic.com/rs/c/prpweb-src-images-space-98af7172.gif)