The Story
FEATURES
- 2LP pressed at RTI & housed in a deluxe Stoughton “tip-on” jacket
- Tracks mastered from original Viv Records analog tapes
- Featuring many previously unreleased compositions and an early draft of Trouble Is A Lonesome Town
- Liner notes by Hunter Lea with an interview from John Dixon
- Includes archival photos and ephemera
DESCRIPTION
Phoenix, Arizona 1955…a twenty-five-year-old disc jockey and fledgling songwriter, Lee Hazlewood, is trying to break into the music industry. He takes Greyhound bus trips to Los Angeles to pitch songs, only to be rejected each time. Undeterred, Lee started a record label called Viv Records. Running the label out of his house, Lee finds the artists, writes the songs, produces the sessions, arranges the pressings of the records, and handles distribution. Recently discovered tapes in the Viv Records archive yielded an unbelievable find, the earliest known recordings of Hazlewood singing his songs…Lee’s first demo! The mysterious and bountiful tapes featured Lee singing early unheard compositions and a complete first draft of his Trouble Is A Lonesome Town song cycle that would become his first official solo album in 1963.
Light in the Attic Records is proud to continue its Lee Hazlewood archival series with 400 Miles From L.A. 1955-56, a collection of previously unknown intimate recordings, never intended for release. Lee sings, plays guitar, and even presses the record button on the tape machine. These are rural sketches and small-town dreams, captured in an innocent time before the path ahead was clear.
These songs rewrite Lee’s recorded history, adding a new first chapter to his saga. For Hazlewood addicts, hearing these early tracks and the embryonic version of Trouble Is A Lonesome Town is akin to finding an early draft of the Old Testament.
“That’s the beauty of Lee’s songwriting. It lives on. People will hear it for the first time, even though it’s fifty years old or whatever, if it’s good enough and strong enough, they’ll accept and like it as much as if it was just created. That’s the wonderful legacy that Lee has. It’s wonderful to look back and make all this early work available. To put “Boots” and all those other LHI songs into perspective. That it all started somewhere and this is where.” – Arizona Music Historian and record producer, John Dixon.
TRACKLIST
- Cross Country Bus
- The Woman I Love
- Five Thousand and One
- Lonesome Day
- A Lady Called Blues
- Five More Miles to Folsom
- Fort Worth
- The Old Man and His Guitar
- Peculiar Guy (Solo Version)
- Long Black Train (Solo Version)
- I Guess It's Love
- It's an Actuality
- Buying on Time
- The Country Bus Tune
- Long Black Train (Band Version)
- Run Boy Run
- Big Joe Slade
- Son of a Gun
- Georgia Chain Gang
- Look at That Woman
- Peculiar Guy (Band Version)
- The Railroad Song
- Six Feet of Chain
- Trouble is a Lonesome Town
LISTEN
Available on Desktop & Mobile
Description
FEATURES
- 2LP pressed at RTI & housed in a deluxe Stoughton “tip-on” jacket
- Tracks mastered from original Viv Records analog tapes
- Featuring many previously unreleased compositions and an early draft of Trouble Is A Lonesome Town
- Liner notes by Hunter Lea with an interview from John Dixon
- Includes archival photos and ephemera
DESCRIPTION
Phoenix, Arizona 1955…a twenty-five-year-old disc jockey and fledgling songwriter, Lee Hazlewood, is trying to break into the music industry. He takes Greyhound bus trips to Los Angeles to pitch songs, only to be rejected each time. Undeterred, Lee started a record label called Viv Records. Running the label out of his house, Lee finds the artists, writes the songs, produces the sessions, arranges the pressings of the records, and handles distribution. Recently discovered tapes in the Viv Records archive yielded an unbelievable find, the earliest known recordings of Hazlewood singing his songs…Lee’s first demo! The mysterious and bountiful tapes featured Lee singing early unheard compositions and a complete first draft of his Trouble Is A Lonesome Town song cycle that would become his first official solo album in 1963.
Light in the Attic Records is proud to continue its Lee Hazlewood archival series with 400 Miles From L.A. 1955-56, a collection of previously unknown intimate recordings, never intended for release. Lee sings, plays guitar, and even presses the record button on the tape machine. These are rural sketches and small-town dreams, captured in an innocent time before the path ahead was clear.
These songs rewrite Lee’s recorded history, adding a new first chapter to his saga. For Hazlewood addicts, hearing these early tracks and the embryonic version of Trouble Is A Lonesome Town is akin to finding an early draft of the Old Testament.
“That’s the beauty of Lee’s songwriting. It lives on. People will hear it for the first time, even though it’s fifty years old or whatever, if it’s good enough and strong enough, they’ll accept and like it as much as if it was just created. That’s the wonderful legacy that Lee has. It’s wonderful to look back and make all this early work available. To put “Boots” and all those other LHI songs into perspective. That it all started somewhere and this is where.” – Arizona Music Historian and record producer, John Dixon.
TRACKLIST
- Cross Country Bus
- The Woman I Love
- Five Thousand and One
- Lonesome Day
- A Lady Called Blues
- Five More Miles to Folsom
- Fort Worth
- The Old Man and His Guitar
- Peculiar Guy (Solo Version)
- Long Black Train (Solo Version)
- I Guess It's Love
- It's an Actuality
- Buying on Time
- The Country Bus Tune
- Long Black Train (Band Version)
- Run Boy Run
- Big Joe Slade
- Son of a Gun
- Georgia Chain Gang
- Look at That Woman
- Peculiar Guy (Band Version)
- The Railroad Song
- Six Feet of Chain
- Trouble is a Lonesome Town
LISTEN
Available on Desktop & Mobile
