Steve Earle
              The Early Tracks


               

               
        By  1980  Steve Earle had had  enough of Nashville. Moving back to Texas,
        he put together a band, The Dukes, and went back to playing the drinking
        dens of his youth. Back in Nashville, a year later, Earle had  now split from
        Sandie and was married to his second  wife, Cynthia.  His private life was in
        turmoil, but  musically Earle was finally on his way.  Or so it seemed.   He
        was signed up as a songwriter by  publishers Roy Dea and Pat Clark  and
        had met  with some success when Johnny Lee took one of his songs, When
        You Fall in Love into the US Top 20 in 1982).  Dea had already worked with
        left-field songwriters like Steve Young and was impressed by Earle's updated
        rockabilly style: a cross between Duane Eddy and Bruce Springsteen.

        When You Fall In Love
        (395K = app.1 minute download time)
         Hear cut from Johnny Lee's "When You Fall In Love"
        written by John Scott Sherrill and Steve Earle
        From the albums Bet your Heart On Me and Greatest Hits


        Steve Earle EP on LSI Records
        Produced by Roy Dea & Pat Carter
        Clark and Dea had formed their own independent label, LSI, and Earle cut
        four songs for it (including Nothin' But You and Continental Trailways
        Blues) which were released as an EP.  Around 1982 Earle recorded a
        rockabilly-style album, Pink and Black, on LSI.

          
        "Pink & Black"  Produced by Roy Dea
        LSI RECORDS
        The LP attracted some attention, but Country music's popularity had waned,
        forcing industry decision-makers to seek out and introduce more unconventional
        artists. Earle seemed to fit the bill.  In 1983 he Signed  with Epic. Unfortunately,
        Earle's spell at Epic reads like a textbook horror story.

           
        "They (Epic) told us that last year the big push had been Ricky Skaggs, the year
        before that Lacy Dalton and that this year it was going to be Steve.  Then they
        signed Exile and decided that they were going to be this year's big push.
        Epic was  convinced this band was going to be the next Alabama."
           
                               
        Epic now owned all four of the tracks Earle had recorded for Clark and Dea,
        and released Nothin' But You as a single. With very little push from the company
        it struggled to reach the Top 50. Back in the studio, Earle cut another six songs,
        but Epic were already voicing their doubts. ' They loved his stuff  but radio thought
        it was too sparse and jarring,. 'We were at the tail end of that Urban Cowboy thing
        and most country was very pop-oriented and over-produced. We had this stripped
        down pure country sound, so we knew we were in trouble.
                 
        Eventually, Earle's publishing deal with Roy Dea and Pat Carter ran its course
        and was not renewed. Disappointed,  Earle signed up with Silverline Goldline,
        a  publishing  company owned by the Oakridge Boys, which bought him into contact
        with company musician-turned-producer Tony Brown. Just as Lomax was about
        to request that Epic let him go, the label dropped Earle at year's end.
       
       

        It was now 1985.
        A contract with MCA, then the most powerful label in country music, led to the
        release of Guitar Town in 1986. It catapulted Earle to instant stardom, winning
        critical acclaim and earning him big-name fans, including rock idol Bruce
        Springsteen. Many of the songs on Guitar town  reflected a life lived on the edge;
        they were comprised of vignettes he had collected  for  years and had worked into
        poignant tunes about the underbelly of American life.  Both country and rock fans
        loved Guitar Town; it quickly went platinum, selling over one million units.
                 
        Produced by Roy Dea and Pat Carter
        for LSI RecordsTracks 1-10 from the Epic Records LP 39226 issued in1987
        Tracks 11&12 from Epic issue 4666 in 1984 Compilation issued  in 1997
        as Koch Records KOC-CD-7903
         
                
               
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