Gary Stewart "You're Not The Woman You Used To Be" (MCA, 1975)
Gary Stewart "Out Of Hand" (RCA, 1975)
Gary Stewart "Your Place Or Mine" (RCA)
Gary Stewart "Steppin' Out" (RCA, 1976)
Gary Stewart "Little Junior" (RCA, 1978)
Gary Stewart "Gary" (RCA, 1979)
Gary Stewart "Cactus And A Rose" (RCA, 1980)
Gary Stewart "Brand New" (Hightone, 1988)
Gary Stewart "Battleground" (Hightone, 1990)
Gary Stewart "I'm A Texan" (Hightone, 1993)
Best-Ofs
Gary Stewart "Gary's Greatest: 17 Original Hits" (Hightone, 1991)
Picking up the slack for the major labels, Hightone gave up the goods with this excellent retrospective of Stewart's RCA years. Most of the great Stewart classics are on here, and that means a bunch of really great, really memorable hard country music all in one place. This is fairly interchangeable with the RCA Essential disc that came out a few years later... both are HIGHLY recommended!
Gary Stewart "The Essential Gary Stewart" (RCA-Nashville, 1996)
Pure gold. I dunno what the deal is with there being two extremely similar best-ofs out there on two different labels... I'm not complaining mind you, just curious. Either one of these discs should rock your world.
Gary Stewart "Best Of The Hightone Years" (Hightone, 2002)
Pretty impressive that his hard-luck, hard-drivin,' hard-drinkin' hard country formula still sounded so damn good, even this late in the game. These 1988-'93 recordings have all the fire and wit of his classic '70s material... In fact, this is simply a damn fine country record, period. Recommended!
Links
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Hightone Records has certainly done right by Stewart. In addition to putting out a fine best-of, they also still have all his recent solo albums in print... and lots of other great bands to check out as well...
Hick Music Index
The 70's wouldn't have been the same without this fella, seein' as how he almost single-handedly brought rowdy drinkin'-and-fightin' honkytonk songs back into vogue. Oh, sure, there was Moe Bandy, who tossed off one good ole boy anthem after another, but those were mostly just cute novelty songs. Listening to Gary Stewart, on the other hand, could actually make you a little bit nervous... like, hey, what would happen if you went into a really gnarly redneck bar and got some dude mad?? Stewart's formula was raw honkytonk misery and a little southern rock THWACK over the head. Like Delbert McClinton, Stewart understood the powerful influence the blues had on country music, and was about as house-rockin' as a country boy could get. Towards the end of the decade he drifted a bit, but resurfaced in the late '80s with a series of solid releases on the independent Hightone label.