Track Listing

1. Crows
2. There Are Some Days
3. The Lovers In Your Dreams
4. Conversation With The Devil
5. Red Dress
6. The River Bed
7. This River Runs Red
8. After The Harvest
9. Airplane Fell Down In Dixie
10. The Messenger

Product Details

• Amazon Sales Rank: #36513 in Music
• Released on: 1999-07-20
• Number of discs: 1
• Dimensions: .23 pounds

Amazon.com's Best of 1999
Once a staple of the Texas "Outlaw" songwriter scene, Ray Wylie Hubbard has moved beyond that scope in the 1990s with a series of highly literate and provocative records. Crusades may just be the best of the lot, filled with bold, inquisitive lyrics and wrapped in understated but vibrant country-folk settings. --Marc Greilsamer

Amazon.com
Nearly titled Ten Zen Sins, Ray Wylie Hubbard's second Rounder release extends and deepens the spiritual tug-of-war of his mature, postoutlaw work. Starting with the thunderous, folk-rock curse of "Crows," the album moves through tent-revival grooves, barrelhouse odes to red dresses, bottleneck meditations on plane wrecks, spare talking blues, elliptical ballads, and bluegrass-laced messages of hope. Rather than offer platitudes or pat answers, Hubbard tests the mysteries he finds with always one more intense temptation, one more unsettling question. Such is Hubbard's dense lyrical vision, and his musical settings are just as telling. For the first time he coproduces with Lloyd Maines, emphasizing the sounds of cutting slide guitar, Dobro, and mandolin and accenting his melodies with female harmony from Patty Griffin, Lisa Mednick, and Terri Hendrix. At a time when many singer-songwriters are courting the adult-contemporary audience with safe, pop-oriented fare, Hubbard's lyrical crusade remains tense, chancy, and remarkably wise. --Roy Kasten

Customer Reviews

He Was Alt-Country When Alt-Country Wasn't Cool
Ray has plugged away for decades trying to live down the memory of writing "Up Against the Wall Redneck Mother". Anyone coming into this or any other Ray disc expecting this sort of barroom sing-along is in the wrong place. Ray writes deep, funny, touching songs with excellent musicianship to back it up.

In his live shows, you have the benefit of hearing the stories behind the songs, and you can see the true skill Ray has acquired at playing the guitar. He really seems to believe what he is singing in every instance, as if he has felt every emotion that is put forth.

In said live shows, the biggest reaction goes to "Conversations With the Devil", which threatens to be his new signature song. It is perhaps the most funny, yet also insightful, thing he has written, and I would think he would gladly replace Redneck Mother with this newer work.

The sound is stripped-down - Ray with a few players - but that's all he needs. The power of the songwriting and performance come through in what is perhaps one of the best country albums in a long time. Forget Nashville. Ray is creating art in Texas.

each disc a new revelation
Tha amazing thing about Ray Wylie is that each disc is so good that you cant believe that the next could possibly be as good. But then the latest release comes along and surpasses the rest. As a songwriter and performer he is simply without parallel. Not only does he write great lyrics, he writes extraordinary music that brings out the most in those lyrics. Then he plumbs the depth of both in that husky evocative voice that plunges right into the listeners heart and soul.

Ray's Crusades Finally Pay Off
This is great American music!

What if radio stations never played Dylan or Springsteen?

Ray Wylie Hubbard is not a new kid on the block, but with Crusades of the Restless Knights, Ray may finally be on his way to getting the recognition he so much deserves. Hubbard gets almost no air time in most markets -- perhaps his thinking persons' country/folk/rock is not what many station directors are looking for. Nonetheless, his well honed musical abilities and intelligent, thought provoking lyrics are winning over new listners every day. People are telling people, and Ray Wylie Hubbard is on his way!

The album is fresh, original Hubbard, covering the spectrum from folk to country to rock. There's nothing shallow and superficial here. This album is nothing but winners, coupling Hubbard's deeply observant, thoughtful, poetic abilities, and his head-nodding, foot-tapping country/folk/rock.

With Crusades, and listners' word-of-mouth, Hubbard is proving that great music will be recognized, whether radio stations play it or not.