Buck Owens
When Buck Owens stepped into the studio in October of 1958 to cut his self-penned single "Second Fiddle," his career at Capitol was idling. That track merely dented the country charts, but it was enough to get him to return to the studio to cut three more singles the following year. All three--his own "Under Your Spell Again," Harlan Howard's "Above and Beyond," and the Owens-Harlan composition "Excuse Me"--hit the Top 10, each one charting higher than the one before it. Those four cuts form the foundation of Owens's debut LP, released in 1961. At this point his music still sounded more in line with the honky-tonk of his Texas birthplace than the edgier Bakersfield style that became his calling card; new recruit and future right-hand man Don Rich hadn't added his signature Telecaster guitar licks yet. That left Ralph Mooney's swooping, whining, stunning pedal steel as the most prominent instrumental voice. Owens filled the record with an assortment of two-and-a-half-minute songs that managed to be both bright and accessible as well as honest and direct, a songwriting combination that would prove successful for him throughout the decade.--Marc Greilsamer