Compadre Records
2003
In The Beginning
About This Album
In the Beginning is, unlike so many posthumous recordings or rip-off collections of sub-par material by major artists, the real thing. These ten songs feature Van Zandt, already developed as a considerable songwriting talent, in his debut Nashville session produced by none other than Cowboy Jack Clement. Some can debate the quality of these songs against his others, but to this critic it doesn't make a whit of difference. In 1966, two years before the issue of For the Sake of the Song, Van Zandt was already deeply entrenched in his rambling tales of losers, gamblers, ne'er-do-wells, and restless drifters who somehow made up his ethos. His poetry, like Bob Dylan's or any great bluesman's, could stand apart from the music. While the material recorded with a band is steeped sonically in the rock sound of the time, it is nonetheless timeless. Anybody whose first couplet on track one is, "I got a black widow for a mama, Lord/I got a Diamond back rattler for a Pa," backed by a driving, lonesome guitar a two-note bassline and garagey 4/4 drumbeat, is already in the pocket of his art. "Black Widow Blues" and "Hunger Child Blues" are out-and-out rockers, with Van Zandt's voice like an Old-Testament prophet abandoned by God roiling above the din.
Track List (try tracks 1,2,3,4,5,6 and 7)

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