Hag-Studio Recordings 1968-1976

• Track Listing

A true legend of American music captured in his prime!

The follow-up to Bear Family's hugely acclaimed 'Untamed Hawk' set

All the studio recordings between 1969 and 1976, including 15 straight #1 country hits.

Includes Vietnam era classics like Okie From Muskogee and The Fightin' Side Of Me, as well as the more moderate unreleased song Somewhere In Between.

More than 20 other unreleased performances!

Merle Haggard occupies a unique place in American music. The man who gave voice to the Silent Majority went on to become a counter-culture favourite. He has scored hits in the 1960s, 1970s, 1980s, 1990s, and 2000s, and still works 200 sold-out road dates a year.

Ever since Bear Family released 'Untamed Hawk' in 1995, we've been asked for a follow-up comprising the rest of his legendary Capitol recordings. This is it?on 6 CDs, and it covers the tumultuous years between 1968 and 1976. The only exclusions are his Jimmie Rodgers tribute (already issued on a single CD by Bear Family) and the live recordings, which will be released in a companion volume.

These were the years when Merle Haggard polarized the USA with songs like Okie From Muskogee and The Fightin' Side Of Me, yet, as this set reveals, his approach to politics was more nuanced than many thought at the time. In an unreleased song (one of many) titled Somewhere In Between he says 'I stand looking at the left wing, and I turn towards the right, and my eyes find both good and bad there on either scene... ' He adds, I'm not too old to understand the young who disagree. ' The unissued recordings also include his original version of That's The Way Love Goes, which became a big hit for him on Epic Records several years later.

These were Merle Haggard's golden years when he gave voice to the voiceless, and scored an unbroken string of #1 hits. This is American country music? make that American music? at it's finest.