GENE WATSON - Matters of the Heart (2012)

'Whenever country music aficionados discuss the genre's best traditional male vocalists, Gene Watson's name is among those that suffice, along with the likes of George Jones (Saturday 12 September 1931 - Friday 26 April 2013), Vern Gosdin (Sunday 5 August 1934 - Tuesday 28 April 2009) and Merle Haggard (Tuesday 6 April 1937 - Wednesday 6 April 2016).

One of the most consistent hit-makers of the 1970s and 1980s, his breakthrough single, 'Love in the Hot Afternoon', made No.3 in the US country charts in 1975 and launched a successful run that included 21 Top 10 singles, among them 'Where Love Begins', 'Farewell Party', 'Fourteen Carat Mind', 'This Dream's on Me', 'Paper Rosie', 'What She Don't Know Won't Hurt Her' and 'Sometimes I Get Lucky & Forget'.

One of country music's all-time finest singers and performers, in his voice is all the ache of existence. His speciality is songs of heartbreak, unrequited love and regret. There are people who sing songs...and then there are the singers' singers.

Gene Watson is in that elite class. He not only possesses a potent set of pipes, but an unerring song sense. The songs from writers like Joe Allen, Dave Kirby (Sunday 10 July 1938 - Saturday 17 April 2004), Tom T. Hall, Buzz Rabin and Harlan Howard (Thursday 8 September 1927 - Sunday 3 March 2002) included here are mainly lesser known classic country songs.

Though some made it as hit singles, many more were hidden away on albums, but all are well worth listening to again and again.

Among their best creations are 'Maybe I Should Have Been Listening', 'The Girl I Used to Run Around On', 'Baby Me Baby', 'Three' and 'Come Back Home'. The by-word of all those songs are meaningful lyrics that get to the very heart and soul of human emotions and relationship issues.

Among the genuine hits here are 'Fourteen Carat Mind', a country chart-topper from 1982 in which Watson's voice masterfully pierces the music with strong effect, ranging from redneck rawness to sensuous sensitivity.

'What She Don't Know Won't Hurt Her' which made the Top Ten in 1983 is poignantly understated and Watson's vocals wring every drop of emotion out of this well-written ballad about a man realising that his cheating is hurting him more than he can stand.

There was a time, some twenty-odd years ago, when Gene was the lone torch carrier for solid traditional Texas honky-tonk music. Whilst everybody around him were drowning the music in lavish strings and getting all dressed up like Urban Cowboys, he was quietly going about his business of performing the real thing.

He is still out there singing peerless country music. For no one, but no one, can sing a country song like the Watson man can. He has survived enough fads to know not to follow them.