Waylon Jennings - Right for the Time (Remembered)
Right for the Time catches Waylon Jennings in the nineties, older and unhurried but still every inch the outlaw, and this Remembered edition gives it a fresh outing on vinyl.
First released in 1996 on the independent Justice Records, the album was produced by Randall Jamail and is built mostly on songs Jennings wrote himself. Cut in a single week of sessions with a band that featured Robby Turner on steel and Dobro and Jesse Dayton on guitar, it has a lived-in, roadhouse warmth that suits his voice perfectly at this stage of his life.
Cactus Texas rolls along on a dusty, loping groove, and the title track shows how sharp his songwriting pen remained. Deep in the West, a duet with his wife Jessi Colter, is the emotional centerpiece, their voices fitting together with decades of shared history. Then there's a gruff, affecting take on Paul Simon's The Boxer, which Waylon makes sound like it was written with him in mind.
Jennings sings with the authority of a man who no longer had anything to prove, low and steady, with that famous baritone still carrying real weight.
It's an overlooked chapter in a legendary story, and a rewarding find for any outlaw country fan digging past the hits.