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Waylon Jennings

Waylon Jennings

The Texas-born voice behind outlaw country, who helped drag Nashville toward rock-edged honky-tonk grit in the 1970s.

APPLE MUSIC

Mammas, Don't Let Your Babies Grow Up to Be Cowboys

Waylon Jennings

MUSIC VIDEO · WaylonJenningsVEVO

Waylon Jennings, The Waymore Blues Band - Drift Away (Never Say Die Film)

VIDEO · FROM WAYLONJENNINGSVEVO ON YOUTUBE

About

MOODS · outlaw · gritty · honky-tonk · rebellious · rootsy · baritone-driven · rock-edged · storytelling · classic country · restless

BIOGRAPHY

Waylon Jennings (1937-2002) grew up in Littlefield, Texas, learning guitar before age ten and working as a radio DJ by twelve. In Lubbock he met Buddy Holly, playing bass in his band before narrowly avoiding the 1959 plane crash that killed Holly, an event later remembered as "The Day the Music Died." After moving to Nashville in 1965 and signing to RCA under Chet Atkins, Jennings released 1973's Honky Tonk Heroes, widely regarded as the first outlaw country album. With Willie Nelson, Jessi Colter, and Tompall Glaser he appeared on 1976's Wanted! The Outlaws, the first country album certified platinum. He later joined Nelson, Johnny Cash, and Kris Kristofferson in the Highwaymen, and was inducted into the Country Music Hall of Fame in 2001.

WHY THEY'RE COOL

Jennings fused folk songwriting, rock rhythm, and honky-tonk instrumentation into a sound that broke from Nashville's polished conventions. His duet with Willie Nelson, "Mammas Don't Let Your Babies Grow Up to Be Cowboys," won a Grammy in 1978, and Wanted! The Outlaws became the first platinum country record. Even as he resisted the outlaw label himself, saying it was partly used "to merchandise and sell records," his baritone-driven, genre-blurring records on Honky Tonk Heroes set a template country artists have followed for decades.

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