Butch Hancock - Only Born (The Wind's Dominion,1979)

It’s tempting to call The Wind’s Dominion Butch Hancock’s Blonde On Blonde, given that Hancock has often been referred to as “the West Texas Dylan,” and that this epic double-album arguably stands as his greatest studio achievement. Originally released in 1979, The Wind’s Dominion must have struck like a coming-of-age lightning-bolt for fans of Hancock, who had made his solo debut the previous year with West Texas Waltzes & Dust-Blown Tractor Tunes after first gaining attention in the early ’70s as a member of the later-to-be-legendary Lubbock group the Flatlanders.The Wind’s Dominion subsequently blew in like a Tornado Alley twister, a fifteen-song opus full of rambling yet finely detailed border stories, character studies and metaphysical meditations.“Only Born”, whose lyrics fill two pages of the CD booklet, is perhaps Hancock’s “Desolation Row”, or, in keeping with the Blonde On Blonde analogy, his “Sad Eyed Lady Of The Lowlands”.